Since the early 1970s, Benwell has combined the studio based craft traditions of the potter with the conceptual painterly and sculptural concerns of a contemporary artist. This exhibition, which is a major retrospective of his work, assembles over 100 ceramics and a small selection of paintings from the earliest phase of his career to the present day, exemplifying the remarkable diversity of his oeuvre.
Benwell has continually challenged the formal conventions of ceramics, while simultaneously drawing upon an extraordinary array of art historical periods and styles as points of reference and influence, from antiquities through to 18th century decorative arts, and modernism, resulting in stand-alone objects that resist conventional categorization.
Heide Museum of Modern Art
8 August to 10 November 2013
Melbourne
Statue – Falling Backwards, 2006, earthenware, 18 x 17 x 24cm
Private Collection, Melbourne
