by Brooks Turner 2022
HAIR+NAILS and TOA Presents are pleased to announce Kim Benson — LONG SWEET GONE, an exhibition of paintings that continue Benson’s process of “doing and undoing” her rich, abstract surfaces.
References to Renaissance paintings, whether in image or color palette, populate many of Benson’s canvases, establishing a historical ground for exploration and excavation. Materially and metaphorically, representations dissolve under a multitude of strategies that include sanding, stenciling, casting, and extruding, as well as more traditional modes of application by brush. The result of this ouroboric process is LONG SWEET GONE, a series of hallucinogenic abstractions that at times feel solid and sculptural like a stucco wall and at others like a gossamer curtain undulating in a soft breeze.
In navigating the history of painting as well as her own excessive processes of repetition and erasure, time emerges as a conceit in Benson’s work; viewer and artist are together suspended in geological, art historical, personal, and anthropocenic time scales materialized in paint.
STATEMENT
2020
My process has become a type of chaos management. I strive to create a painting that plays with the viewer’s comprehension of space, form, and illusion by complicating the visual pathways. I am a materialist who is continually fascinated with the processes of painting. I utilize a myriad of different techniques including but not limited to brushing, spraying, sanding, scraping, rubbing and printing. Along with the mechanics I am equally interested in the history of painting. Currently, I am looking back to the 17th century Dutch still-life genre, in particular the paintings by Maria van Oosterwijck, for both their array of metaphors and formal configurations, and even further back to the Etruscan tomb paintings from 4th century BCE for their rich and distressed surfaces suggesting ideas of loss, decay, and transformation. By referencing these sources and delving deep into process, I consider my own conceptual concerns in order to build my personal painting language. Although, these themes might at first seem disparate, they are deep rooted, and offer an endless array of problems to discover.
BRIEF RESUME (CV here)
Education
2015 Master of Fine Arts Candidate, University of Wisconsin-Madison
2014 Master of Arts , University of Wisconsin-Madison
2008 Bachelor of Fine Arts, College of Visual Arts, St. Paul MN
Residencies
Artist in Residence, La Macina di San Cresci, Greve, Chinati, Italy, (April 3-13)
4-Day Fresco painting workshop in Florence, Italy, Instructor: Emanuele Capozza
Adams State University AIR Program, Spring 2019, Alamosa, CO
McCanna House Artist in Residence, North Dakota Museum of Art, August 2017, Grand Forks, ND
Jentel Artist Residency, Award Recipient, Sept-October 2017, Jentel, WY
3x5: The Soap Factory Emerging Artist Residency Program, July 2016, Minneapolis, MN
Recent Exhibitions (solo*)
2023. Femmenology, group exhibition, Jessica Silverman Gallery, San Francisco, CA
2022 Long Sweet Gone, TOA Presents (via Hair + Nails), Minneapolis, MN*
Kim Benson in conversation with Robert Cozzolino, Patrick and Aimee Butler Curator of Paintings at the Mia Video HERE.
Hair + Nails Exhibition Zine (PDF) - Long Sweet Gone
2020 HELL DAISY /// 10.03.20 – 11.08.20 Hair+Nails, Minneapolis, MN*
Conversation with Artist and H+N Video HERE.
Video Project - Molt (2020) by Kim Benson and Lee Noble
2018 RELIEF: THREE FRESH APPROACHES TO BUILDING SURFACE // Rachel Collier, Kim Benson, Sheila Wagner // Hair+Nails, Minneapolis, MN
Photo by Emma Beatrez (2022)