Practical Magic: Johannah Herr
Johannah Herr, Currency, 2019, vinyl, Dim Variable (approximately 2000 sqft), commissioned installation at 1 New York Plaza, in New York City’s Financial District
Practical Magic is an online interview series with creatives discussing their practices - the highs, the lows, the daily routines, what inspires them, and more - proving art world creatives are the real influencers of today.
interview with: JOHANNAH HERR
artist, activist, co-founder of Daughter’s Rising
Johannah is a friend of ours and while we have yet to curate her work into an exhibition, we’ve been a fan and follower for quite some time. A bit about her:
image courtesy of the artist
Johannah Herr is an interdisciplinary artist and designer whose work explores State sanctioned violence in America. She holds an MFA in Sculpture from Cranbrook Academy of Art (2016) and a BFA in Fine Arts from Parsons (2009). She is also the Co-Founder of Daughters Rising, an anti-human trafficking, indigenous women’s empowerment NGO based in Mae Wang, Thailand. She lives and works between Brooklyn and Mae Wang.
We connected with Johannah in the midst of her managing a fundraiser for Daughter’s Rising to recoup funding lost due to COVID-19. The art auction closed today but you can still donate to support their mission.
In our interview, Johannah gives us a peak behind the curtain on her fear of failure, The Act of Killing as a major film influence on her work, grad school, and more.
PP: Did you receive a formal education for the work you do currently? Either way, do you think it has supported/informed the outcome of your career and your future goals?
JH: My practice is deeply impacted by my experience in grad school at Cranbrook. The place is more of an artist colony than a school-- no grades, no classes, but really studio-driven and self-directed. I had an incredible mentor there, Heather McGill, who stressed that we need to be working ALL THE TIME-- thinking through making and just being present in our studio. (I'm a work-o-holic so I was like, perfect!). It also showed me how incredible and important it is to be part of an artist community-- to value and cultivate the relationships with artists around you as collaborators and support network. So constantly working and building artist family have really informed / supported my career.
PP: Who or what are major influences for you right now and why?
JH: Judith Butler's Frames of War and Susan Sontag's Regarding the Pain of Others continue to be big influences on my practice, particularly thinking about how we “bear witness” to trauma. I am [also] deeply interested in Japanese Love Hotels and Casinos for their use of maximalist spectacle / fabricated fantasy.
Artists who I think about a lot are Nick Cave and Sanford Biggers — they both explore violent, charged subject matter while also having practices deeply steeped in material exploration and joy. [Other influences are] Piotr Szyhalski, Regina José Galindo, Alfredo Jaar, Sam Durant and Teresa Margolles — who all have really different practices but push us to break complacency with systems of power.
American War Rug III (El Paso Shooting), 2020, tufted rug using acrylic, wool and cotton yarn
PP: If you had to pick a film that you feel inspires your practice in some way, which would it be and why?
JH: The Act of Killing is a perfect cinematic vessel to talk about my practice. It's a documentary about the Indonesian mass killings of 1965–66 and centers around one of the leaders of the death squad, Anwar Congo. In addition to having personally killed 1000 people, Anwar is a big Hollywood movie buff, so instead of the usual interview format, filmmakers ask him to collaborate with them to reenact scenes from his killings in the style of his favorite film genres. The production of these strange and terrifying reenactments is inter-spliced with gorgeously epic shots of Indonesian dancers in front of waterfalls and confusingly heartwarming vignettes of Anwar showing the movie to his grand-kids.
PP: What are you listening to in your studio or when you work?
JH: It's a pretty scattered list — Tom Waits, A Tribe Called Red, Talking Heads, Lizzo, Joni Mitchell, The Cranberries, The Dead Kennedys, Santigold
(personally, we’re fans of a music-to-fit-the-mood selection too)
Johannah’s current meme mood, to which we say “same”
(clearly y’all can see a trend setting for these interview prompts)
PP: Current binge-worthy tv/film recommendation?
JH: Altered Carbon, Season 1
PP: What's your favorite article of clothing to wear and why?
JH: Any patterned jumpsuit!
patterns hide stains so you have to wash it less
it's a one-step dressing process
it seems fancy but is also good for working in the studio
who doesn't love getting naked in public restrooms??
PP: Success & failure is subjective - what to you was the most successful moment that you’ve had as a creative, and why was it successful or meaningful to you? What was a moment of failure that you've had, and how did you overcome it?
JH: Let's talk about failure! I have deep anxiety in my practice about making the kind of charged political work that I do as a white artist. I have a constant fear that each work I make will be a myopic failure and everyone will see me as a monster. And I have definitely gotten it wrong sometimes (particularly when I started to explore this current work at the end of grad school). But I think this fear is really useful because it puts my artist ego in check-- and makes me really consider my research, ideas, material usage, etc on a deeper level. I will still probably get things wrong but I think feeling on the constant edge of failure is helpful in some ways.
“Redaction Order 13767” creates a redaction poem of Executive Order #13767 (Border Security and Immigration Enforcement Improvements). By omitting the majority of the text in the original order, the redaction is both an assertion of resistance to the anti-immigration policies and xenophobic attitudes propagated by the current administration, and a cathartic hopeful exercise of a how re-imagined policy might actually strive to create equity."
-Johannah Herr
Redaction Order 13767, 2018. series of 5, vinyl and archival print on paper
FUN FACT -
We just launched a first mini collection of face covers with some of the artists in our network, including Johannah!
Click on over to our MiP shop page to collect this badass design. Plus Johannah will be donating profits from her collab product to her non-profit Daughter’s Rising.
You can check out more from Johannah Herr on the web and on Instagram at:
Practical Magic interviews posts every Tuesday and Thursday - check back weekly to see who we’re chatting with next.