A stark continuation of her award winning series, House on Fire (2009), photographer Sarah Anne Johnson returns to her maternal family's story through a new era of performance-based video installations with The Kitchen (2016). In the 1950s, Johnson’s maternal grandmother was an unsuspecting participant in a CIA research program. Seeking treatment for post-partum depression, she was subjected to a series of mind control experiments at the Allen Memorial Institute at McGill University, Montreal. Addressing the generational trauma of these experiments within the domesticated space, Johnson continues to span her artistic practice from performance to video to further investigate and embody the difficult histories and its effects on her family. As the second video installation following the fifteen-channel performance installation, Hospital Hallway (2015), Gallery 44 is pleased to present the premiere of The Kitchen as part of the 29th edition of The Images Festival.
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Sarah Anne Johnson was born in 1976 in Winnipeg, Manitoba. She received her BFA from the University of Manitoba and completed her MFA at The Yale School of Art. Johnson’s work has been exhibited in numerous solo and group exhibitions internationally. She is the recipient of numerous grants and awards and is included in several distinguished collections. Currently, she lives in Winnipeg. She is represented by Julie Saul Gallery in New York, Stephen Bulger in Toronto and Division Gallery in Montreal.