Artist preserving historic Pleasant Grove homes in paint

(Daily Herald) A local artist known for documenting hundreds of historic homes in paintings -- some just before they were torn down --has set her eyes and brushes on Pleasant Grove.

Last year, American Fork purchased 37 of Mary Ann Judd Johnson's paintings of historic local homes for $43,000. Lehi paid $150,000 for 230 of Johnson's works, which depict in classic detail the historic homes and buildings of that city.

For more than a year now, Johnson has quietly been painting Pleasant Grove's historic homes. She has no commission from the city, nor has she asked for one. Indeed, those now living in the homes don't even know their homes have been memorialized in art.

For Johnson, the paintings are a work of love, an homage to her husband's childhood stompings. The collection started when she painted her husband's ancestral Pleasant Grove home for a family reunion.

Johnson recently allowed the Daily Herald the first glimpse of the collection, which she says will be her last series documenting local homes. She has completed 20 paintings and this winter will complete another 30 or so. She has also painted large tableaux of some of the valley's most iconic buildings and landscapes, but they are not for sale, and she asked the Daily Herald not to reveal the subject of those paintings because there could be intense local interest in purchasing or replicating them.

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