By Philip Sean Curran, Staff Writer
Margaret Johnson spent a lifetime in art, a late artist from Princeton whose work now hangs in the Witherspoon Hall municipal building.
Ms. Johnson’s two adult daughters, Aline and Lonni, on Friday joined friends for the unveiling of a print that Ms. Johnson had created in 1982, called “Where.” It is mounted on a wall outside the community meeting room, one of the first things visitors will see when they walk in the side entrance of the seat of government.
“I remember when I first became mayor and we had just consolidated,” Mayor Liz Lempert said at the ceremony, “I received many comments about the sterility and some coldness of Witherspoon Hall and what could we do to make this a more inviting building.”
She said she believes art helps do that, and thanked the Johnson family for the gift.
Councilman Bernard P. Miller had approached Ms. Aline Johnson about acquiring one of her mother’s artworks to display permanently. Ms. Aline Johnson said she was “touched” by the request, with “Where” now joining two other pieces of art in the building.
“Over the years, I’ve come to believe that presence, or conversely, the absence of art reflects the soul of an institution,” he said during the ceremony. “If it’s there, it is a welcoming and perceptive institution. If it’s not, it can be very cold and sterile.”
Margaret Johnson, known to friends as Maggi, lived in Princeton for 60 years, first in the old borough and then the township. “So she loved the whole town,” Ms. Aline Johnson said.
Her artwork is in the collections of museums around the world, including Japan, where she lived for nearly nine years. She died in 2015, at 97.
Princeton Arts Council executive director Jeff Nathanson recalled meeting Ms. Margaret Johnson in 2003. He remembered going down the spiral stairs at her house to get to her studio.
“And my first impression of Maggi was she was just such a sweet, gentle, kind, loving, nice person,” he said.
