Benjamin Britton Interview
After a yearlong hiatus from my Midas Touch Interview series, it’s a pleasure to finally be back with a new interview.
This time, I’m talking to Benjamin Britton about his eclectic practice, the density and complexity of his work, and the ideas that breeds life into the forms that make up his paintings. I learned a lot, and I hope you will too.
Here’s my interview with Benjamin.
Benjamin Britton, Put to purpose any unsquandered recklessness, 2013
PB: Hey Benjamin, thank you for doing this. When I first encountered your work, I was awestruck. It's quite rare to come across largely abstract work with such a high level of internal logic. There's a strong coherence in your paintings, a sense of perspective that works on a multitude of levels. Needless to say, I've been hypnotized, and hopefully this interview will escort me and the readers even deeper into your world.
First of all, I'm curious about your approach, since your work posses such a high level of chaotic complexity, and yet ends up being harmonic in it's totality. Can you share some of the guiding principles you work from?
BB: Thanks for looking and for asking about my paintings. I think a chaotic painting can appear harmonic when it feels like there are relationships between forms. The relationships could be considered and determined, or defined in terms of ambiguity or slippage, and could come about through generation, intuition, or accident, but they should be felt there if we look.
It’s all about relationships and feelings! Pictorial space, whether chaotic or any other characterization, becomes plastic when the relationships can be felt. When I’m working, I ask the different parts of the painting what they are doing. Like, what’s that color doing? Or, what’s that shape doing? How’s it going to go with that one over there? It’s good when forms in the painting have a “friend”, like another form with whom they share something. What’s in common can be anything; an interval, an edge texture, or perspectival orientation.
Also, I rely on color and paint application to carry the day in paintings that often begin with awkward propositions. Color is the chief-doctor-queen-problem-solver. And, in a more dispersed way, in many separate passages I’m thinking about how I can make the surfaces as desirable as I have the stamina to execute. By trying for a similar intention in discrete moments all over the picture, a collective sensation can sort of radiate from a painting.
Benjamin Britton, Even beyond the fruitful bounty of the supernormal, 2013
PB: That's a great way to articulate it, because I think a lot of people still have no idea about the intricate thought process that goes into constructing abstract work. What you're describing is almost akin to constructing a ecosystem within a simulation. You're playing with the malleable nature of reality and perception, and in turn end up making work that really captures and activates the viewers imagination.
If you don't mind, I'd like to focus a little bit on this relationship between chaos and harmony in your work, the tension it produces is very much like being in the world, especially in these chaotic times with informational overload and so forth. Which brings me to my next question, which is about the underlying philosophy that comes before the forms and imbues them with meaning when executed. I know it’s a broad question, but what I'd really like to know more about, is some of the ideas and philosophy behind the strokes and forms that makes up a finished work in relation to the dichotomy of chaos and harmony.
BB: Sure, so there are always paths through my pictures, and even if they are convoluted, they are navigable. The spaces the paintings can can get dense, and are sometimes pressurized by color or speed or focus to stress the transitions between one path and another. Some forms guide the viewer, while others meet them. I think about the logic of the space a lot especially in the early stages, trying to see what the painting suggests.
Painting has an opportunity for the viewer to project their bodies into an artificial space through looking. I want to deliver on that possibility. Lately, I am interested in inspiring a feeling of disconnect between the sensation of where the body is and the knowledge of its location in space. For me, that dislocation is an allegory of the challenges and wonder that we have in our relationship to nature. People have had vivid imaginations for a long time, but in the history of representation and technological innovation there has never been a time like this. And, it is coincident with very rapid changes in the ecological environment. I think this state of affairs affects our perspective and our ability locate ourselves in space and time.
I’ve also been working with the idea that the present moment is always composed of shifting attentions; sensation, cognition, past memories, and future plans or fantasies. That idea led to searching out forms that contain the visual qualities of multiple moments within a single picture space. I think that's why my paintings might resonate with that feeling of being-in-the-world today.
Benjamin Britton, Indefatiguable pursuit of an unattainable, 2012
PB: Yeah, it's quite a paradox isn't it? We migrate toward cities to indulge in the opportunities they provide, and in doing so, we inadvertently alienate ourselves from nature. Not only in terms of the peace of mind the countryside provides, for instance, but also from the part of our consciousness that makes us feel truly connected. Which is then reflected in our relationship to nature, which in turn becomes an abstract concept to most people living in cities.
Meanwhile the technological progression provides another sort of connection, but one that might not be aligned with our biology and psychology, through social media, search engines and so forth. The other night I was sitting at a table in a nightclub, the most stimulating environment I could possibly imagine, loud music, beautiful people all around, champagne, colored lights, mirrors and all that jazz. Next to me was a girl, on her phone, blazing through tabs at lightning speed, so I told her "you really like your phone, don't you?", and she said "I love my phone" and proceeded to caress and kiss it. At that moment I experienced a profound fear for the future.
The sheer relativity and plasticity of our artificial environments from cities to technology have created this new paradigm, and it seems almost impossible to find a stable balance, because the progression moves so fast that it changes constantly. And that's one of the things I feel you capture in your work, a sense of dislocation and distortion through complexity, which from another perspective means adventure. The adventure of not knowing, being lost, and trying to make sense. One of the direct ways that manifest itself in your work, from my perspective, is through outer space, the space beyond our pale blue dot. And I want to go on that voyage, because it's such a leap in terms of perspective. In a sense, I will say, it's probably the ultimate leap.
I feel like if I ask a direct question here, I might limit your response, so feel free to comment in whatever way you see fit.
BB: Nature is what it’s all built upon. The physical dimensions and characteristics of space/time which are nature, are part of everything we do. It is a primary relationship for all beings. The ecological environment is usually what we intend when we say nature, but it’s there in every environment, like space too, right? I would like to make paintings that honor the use of the senses we have evolved with under those conditions. The mechanism of how we see determines our perspective. Add to that how memory is constructed and perceived, and feels a certain way, and there’s an opportunity for a painting to show how the feeling of one's location is actually always the feeling of multiple locations. We make the feeling of the present out of the sensed, residual, and formative. It's a little indeterminate but super exciting to feel, and for me that goes double when we are talking about the ecological environment. When in a space of great beauty in nature it positively fries me, seems to gather more significance to memory and future plans, and makes loads of life seem to be some side-business by comparison. It is such an excellent planet, can’t really say enough about that.
Anyway, times are tough out there, and understandably people do all kinds of things to feel better. I think contemporary life is a challenge for us in a different way that, as far as I can tell from the past, it hasn’t been historically. I am not an expert on this at all, but I do think about our bodies and minds adapted to conditions found in nature for most of our history as a species, and I think what we ask them to do today as being perhaps different in many ways. No moral position, except I advocate for being lost occasionally, for indeterminacy, for a bit of not-knowing, for slow feelings to emerge. It’s cool to connect with something that doesn’t reflect an external image of ourselves, but is either oblivious to us or maybe even resonates with a primordial interiority. Technology can mean anything from a sharp rock to a supercomputer, but the technology of representation in a digitally mediated environment is very convincing, I guess, to our senses. Maybe being located via GPS is not the same as knowing where you are. Painting is an ancient technology, and perspective is a major thing that paintings can address.
Benjamin Britton, Throw me the idol, I'll give you the whip, 2014
PB: I couldn't agree with you more. Now, before we wrap up, there's one thing I always like to ask about in these interviews, which is very much akin to painting in the sense of being a introspective pursuit. Reading, and namely what you've been reading lately? And also, if you care to elaborate on it, what might be some of the key insights from your reading in relation to your work recently?
I just finished The White Castle by Orhan Pamuk, a really lovely tale about the flexibility and construction of identity, representation, and perspective. I also really loved his books Snow, and My Name is Red. Along those lines and relating to my paintings, I’d have to say In Search of Lost Time. I’ve been reading one of the books each summer for three years so last summer was The Guermantes Way. Proust is exquisite and digressive, clearly, and not something I can really take down in the rest of the year, thus the summer reading when things are a bit more peaceful for me. It’s dense in the normal sense relating to text, yes, but only feels that way when it’s rushed. There's so much that I can’t stress expectations of ever finishing, just relax and take in a sentence at a time, floating, letting the line pay out in the mind, and feel the moments when the slack comes out and Proust's revelatory digressions on the senses, nature, memory, and desire come tight and wham! There’s the plasticity of memory, cognition, sensation, and future intentions swimming in all the complexity of interiority and interaction, and everything comes with the feelings so gilded and tended, it’s pretty good.
I read Swann’s Way at the same time as I was writing a very long letter about the near past, expressing desires for the future, and having some lovely experiences in the present, and this was part of the original inspiration for the structure of the current paintings. As a tangent from Proust, I recently read An Officer and a Spy, by Robert Harris. This historical fiction is about the Dreyfus Affair, which occurs in France at the same time as the Guermantes Way. I won’t go on too much but let’s just say it is not a story you can put down, and is about a whistleblower in the middle of a racist conspiracy at the highest levels of the military and government, operating with considerable popular support in a post-fact media landscape. Could be a good read right about now. Next up, My Brilliant Friend, by Elena Ferrante.
Thanks for asking, and thanks for taking the time to interview me about my paintings.
Installation shot from Benjamin Britton’s current exhibition on view at Marcia Wood Gallery, 1037 Monroe Drive, Atlanta through Dec 23rd.
My pleasure! And thank you very much for taking the time to share your ideas as well as opening up. It's been insightful. Before I let you go, is there a good way for me and the readers to stay updated on your work?
Sure, my website is www.benjaminbritton.com, and my instagram is brittonbenjamin. I have a solo show up right now, The Incandescent Sub-Present, through Dec. 23rd at Marcia Wood Gallery. Both our sites have forms to get on mailing lists for future announcements. Thank you for looking!
Thanks for reading, if you want future interviews straight to your inbox, you can join my personal mailing list here.
