Untitled by Poppy Johnson is the “detritus of an unannounced and unauthorized performance that took place at 355 West Broadway Between May 1, 1976 and June 30, 1976”. The work begins with a declaration of Johnson’s intent to stage a long term performance art piece in which she types every thought she has for 3 hours every day for a month. While these pages are not the transcript of her project, they serve as proof of concept. In Untitled, Johnson records each thought she has over the course of 35 pages, exploring everything from her experiences as a mother, her family’s role in the Civil War, and the politics of crying.

Poppy Johnson (b. 1949) is a performance artist and librarian based in Shelter Island, NY. Johnson has staged performances at galleries including Rene Block, Leo Castelli, and Franklin Furnace, as well as an unauthorized performance at the Museum of Modern Art, in protest of the Vietnam War. During her time in Manhattan, Johnson ran the $100 Gallery, where she sold the works of artists like Sol Le Witt, Robert Morris, and Rosemarie Castoro for a flat rate of $100. In 1986, Johnson joined the Floyd Memorial Library, where she worked for 35 years before retiring in 2021.