The Art of Being: An interview with Yogi Meaghan Johnson

Meaghan Johnson is the founder and director of Queen Street Yoga, a 40 under 40 award winner and a self-proclaimed arts enthusiast. The Kitchener-Waterloo Art Gallery has teamed up with Meaghan to produce, “The Art of Being,” a two-hour workshop on August 26th that blends yoga and meditation with exploration of the Gallery’s current exhibitions. KW|AG catches up with Meaghan to talk about the connection between art and yoga.

What connections do you see between art and yoga?
Art Galleries, for me, are a place of refuge from the busyness of the world, a quiet open place full of beauty, story, challenge, sorrow and playfulness where my only responsibility is to explore, be open and experience the worlds that the artist is showing me.  Yoga and meditation have very similar purposes, to be present, to get out of an often judging mind and to open to an inner world of experience, physically, emotionally and psychologically.

Does your yoga practice change the way you experience art?
As my capacity to be in my own body and experience grows, my enjoyment of art has increased. Also, my ability to just be with an art work helps me to have insight into myself as I become aware of my physical, emotional and psychological reactions to that piece.  In this way, the Gallery becomes a meditation hall, a safe space for me to come into presence with myself, and each piece of art acts as a playground, providing me with a challenge through which I get to know myself and others more deeply.

What will “The Art of Being” accomplish?
Since we already are more attuned to our minds and emotions, much more than our bodies, my hope is that this workshop will awaken our experience of the body, through movement, yoga and meditation. And then, as a group we go out on an adventure through the gallery with this embodied awareness and see what happens. It could be as simple as really being aware of your feet on the floor as you move through the gallery, and seeing how that shifts your experience, or for those with more experience in meditation and yoga you might notice your mental reaction to a piece, and look to see what the physical reactions are.

Meaghan Johnson

“Through this experiment of sense and physical awareness, we may deepen our capacity to be present with ourselves, and also start to see art and art galleries as a place of refuge, learning and playgrounds of experience.” Meaghan Johnson

For more information and registration, please visit the KW|AG Art & Soul website.