Scott Johnson on Art, Architecture & Ojai

Scott Johnson, founding partner of Johnson-Fain in Los Angeles, has lived with feet in both the world of art and of architecture. During the pandemic, holed up in his Ojai home, he wrote "Uncommon Ground: Notes on the Visual Arts + Architecture." Johnson is both a builder and visual artist and seeks common understandings between the two disciplines. He and wife Dr. Meg Bates, a prominent ob-gyn doctor, built their Ojai home as a retreat from the city's hurly-burly and found themselves spending a lot of time during the lockdown with friends and family. Scott took the opportunity to write the book, and build the Art Barn. His projecets will be featured in the Winter issue of Ojai Quarterly, coming out Thanksgiving.  We talk about Fox Plaza, the towering structure in downtown LA that Johnson built in the 1980s, that was practically a character in itself for the blockbuster "Diehard" movie. We also talk about Le Corbusier, city planning, Ojai neighbors and the Ojai Music Festival. We did not talk about scream therapy, Sandy Koufax or the voyages of Thor Heyerdahl.