Sarah Anne Johnson: A Mountain and a Forest | YOSSI MILO

Sarah Anne Johnson's latest exhibition, A Mountain and a Forest, is stepping into a world where nature flows with unseen energy at Yossi Milo Gallery from March 13 to April 26, 2025. Trees shine, mountains breathe, and lights bend with an almost surreal feeling. Within her firm grasp of blending photography with painting and mixed media, she doesn't merely landscape; she transforms them with turning these artworks into something that speaks as much of memory and sensation as it does of locationality.

 

Sarah presents two new series in the exhibition, Cedar Forest and Mountain. Both continue to extend her Woodland project yet in very different directions. One plunges the viewer into monumental cedar groves in British Columbia, while the other is a meditative reflection of a personal journey through Jasper National Park. Together the two series contemplate the relationship between presence and memory, highlighting the difference between seeing a place and truly experiencing it.

 

The trees in Cedar Forest are now alive in their origins, with trunks and branches vibrating with colors-unnatural yet so beautifully mesmerizing. Johnson further amplifies these images with oil paint, holographic tape, and gold leaf,-creating the extraordinary from the familiar. "Orange Stump (Cedar Forest)" (2025) lucently scintillates with fiery warmth; its tree rings are burning as embers. "Glow (Cedar Forest)" (2025) depicts the golden ember left from late-afternoon sunlight filtering through the treetops. Beyond the evocation of visuality, these pieces refer to the deep-rooted connections between trees and to the silent communication that occurs underground, which may be unseen but felt.

 

If Cedar Forest represents the energy of nature, Mountain embodies nostalgia and how memories are transformed over time. A weeklong venture through Jasper National Park provided the basis for this series, with Johnson capturing moments of introspection in conjunction with adventure. Crisp black-and-white images that range from black-and-white to soft glowing color will mimic this pristine and melancholy look, to how some memories remain crystal clear while others fade. In "A Mountain (Mountain)" (2025), light descends through a rough landscape, a detail under which the beam is carefully enhanced with hand-painted enhancements that direct the viewer toward the emotional heart of the scene. The difference is that you feel expansive within Cedar Forest; Mountain is very private, and a handmade frame becomes a vessel for a precious moment that is contained and preserved through the artist's hand.

 

In "Magic Hour (Cedar Forest)" (2024), Johnson plays with textures and light to produce an almost other-worldly image. Gold leaf accents mimic the fleeting glow of sunset, converting an ordinary forest scene into something magical. Likewise, "Summer Sun (Cedar Forest)" (2025) conveys the sensation of standing in a sunlit clearing and feeling the warmth of light.

 

Johnson's ability lies in combining emotions with visual experiences, inviting the audience to fully immerse onself in natural spaces. A Mountain and a Forest is not about looking at places; rather, it is all about feeling them, losing ourselves perhaps, and finding a part of ourselves within them.