Deborah Johnson

Deborah Johnson — also known as CandyStations — is a multimedia artist, visual librettist, designer, and educator. She creates multifaceted visuals for stage and screen by weaving analog and digital processes, infused with research, experimentation, and rigor.

She has collaborated with a wide range of artists, including Sufjan Stevens, Sarah Kirkland Snider, Sofi Tukker, M83, Annie B. Parson, Tamar-kali, Ray LaMontagne, Kronos Quartet, Alarm Will Sound, Bang on a Can, and Wilco — with performances at Lincoln Center, Coachella, Disney Concert Hall, Brooklyn Academy of Music, The Museum of Modern Art, MASS MoCA, Radio City Music Hall, Madison Square Garden, The Fillmore, and Wiener Konzerthaus.

She has produced site-specific performances and installations at SXSW, Lighthouse ArtSpace, Sundance, 92Y Tribeca, MoMA, Chicago’s Millennium Park, and the Baltimore Museum of Art, with residencies at MASS MoCA, The Experimental Television Center, NYU, Slalom NYC, and The Atlantic Center for the Arts. She presents regularly on performance design and the evolving relationship between classical and emerging technologies as an artist and educator. She is a recipient of a New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA) Film & Video Grant in New Technology for her incorporation of volumetric capture and real-time processes for Hildegard, a new opera produced by Beth Morrison Projects and directed by Elkhanah Pulitzer.

A Professor at Pratt Institute, she teaches Time and Movement alongside Light, Color, and Design, building responsive visual worlds that expand the synesthetic architecture of live performance.

BFA, Maryland Institute College of Art
MS, New York University, Tandon School of Engineering

• Joan of the City (2026 – 2027)
  Projection design and video direction for a first-of-its-kind, site-specific mixed-reality opera. Libretto and score by Kamala Sankaram, direction by Kristin Marting. Texts by the clients of Mary’s Place and MICAH House.

• Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Life Is Scary (2026)
  Multi-dimensional light drawings and compositing; a collaboration with filmmaker Braden King on Will Oldham’s new-old-media music video.

• Hildegard (2025 – Present)
  Artwork and projection design for Sarah Kirkland Snider’s new opera, produced by Beth Morrison Projects—sold-out premieres at The Wallis with LA Opera, November 2025, and Prototype Festival, 2026.

• Sandbox Percussion, Canto Ostinato (June 2025 – Present)
  Creative direction and visual design with Louise Lessél for a 75-minute, audio-responsive TouchDesigner composition with custom lights and shadows for Grammy-nominated Sandbox Percussion. Produced by American Modern Opera Company for the Lincoln Center premiere and tour.

• Eye of Mnemosyne, Rochester Philharmonic (May 2024 – Present)
  Creative direction, visual libretto, and projection design for a new work with Sarah Kirkland Snider, commissioned by the Rochester Philharmonic, inspired by the muses of Kodak founder George Eastman.

• Mass for the Endangered (2021 – Present)
  Design and direction for the visual album and live staging for Sarah Kirkland Snider’s oratorio. Read about our collaboration on Nonesuch.com.

• The Breathe Project (Feb 2025)
  Presenter at CAA 113th Annual Conference for Breathe, an original project developed at Pratt Institute.

• NYU Tandon @The Yard Residency (Nov 2024 – Present)
  Artist-in-residence with Louise Lessél, developing 4D volumetric capture techniques and interactive light and shadow systems using DMX control for stage and installation.

• NSF AI Performance Lab Panelist (Sep 2024)
  Closing panel on “Experience, Design, Immersion,” moderated by Luke Dubois, discussing my trepidatious use of AI in
  Eye of Mnemosyne to dramaturgical effect.

• Ad Astra Podcast (Oct 2024)
  Episode 08: Space in Visual Design with Deborah Johnson.