Melissa Johnson
majknits.bsky.social
Melissa Johnson
@majknits.bsky.social
Art historian, professor, former archivist, killjoy feminist, typist, knitter, embroiderer, sewist. Trying to live a life that's sustainable. Exploring research-creation by reading/re-reading/re-writing/re-working the writing of Virginia Woolf.
Beginnings of a sweater.
April 7, 2025 at 2:40 PM
February 1, 2025 at 3:51 PM
How are you dealing? Do you have an amulet to level against what feels like disaster? I admit, I’m shielding my eyes at times (like my cat, Sam) but only in order to be able to focus on work.
January 29, 2025 at 2:55 PM
I got new pens in the mail the other day! Some are so fine - like .28 mm, others .38 mm - so I’ve been playing with these drawings. Trying to create folds in the fabric mesh. #drawnthreads #drawing
January 19, 2025 at 5:13 PM
…not a man, but a swarm, a cloud, a buzz of words, darting this way and that, clustering, quivering and hanging suspended.” (Virginia Woolf, “The Man at the Gate,” The Death of the Moth, and other essays) (Tactile Investigations & Woolf Words)
January 14, 2025 at 1:25 PM
Early stage of stitching. Establishing pattern and structure. I kind of like it like this but will keep going.
January 9, 2025 at 12:05 AM
Holiday light extravaganza in Normal IL - every year there are more!
December 14, 2024 at 3:12 PM
✨💐✨
November 27, 2024 at 4:31 PM
A new-to-me painting in the Art Institute of Chicago by Hannah Hoech, “Vegetative” 1950, oil on canvas. ✨✨✨✨
November 22, 2024 at 9:18 PM
Paul Klee, "Fleeing Ghost" (Fliehender Geist), 1929, at the Art Institute of Chicago. I visit with this piece each time, imagining Klee in 1929, nine years after his "Angelus Novus" (1920), Walter Benjamin's "angel of history"
November 19, 2024 at 11:57 AM
Paula Modersohn-Becker, “Woman Weaving in Profile” (1898-99) at the Art Institute of Chicago - the gesture of her hands, the thread just visible.
November 19, 2024 at 11:37 AM
“We are whirled asunder”
- Virginia Woolf, The Waves

Figuring out how I might use this space…. For now, will introduce myself with some of my
#woolfwords #tactileinvestigations
November 15, 2024 at 2:02 PM
“It is a very agreeable thing to have drawn work made of thread…” Gertrude Stein, How to Write #drawnthreads #gertrudestein
November 15, 2024 at 12:45 PM
November 13, 2024 at 3:18 AM