Susan Inglett Gallery is pleased to present As We Breathe, a series of new paintings and works on paper by BENJAMIN DEGEN, in his fifth solo exhibition with the gallery from 2 February to 11 March 2023.

"HUMAN AFFAIRS COME AND GO WHILE RIVERS AND MOUNTAINS ARE ESSENTIALLY CHANGELESS…THE PAINTER'S TASK IS NOT SIMPLY TO CAPTURE THE OUTER FORM OF HIS SUBJECT. IT IS EVEN MORE IMPORTANT TO GRASP ITS SPIRIT OR ESSENCE AND TO MAKE THIS VISIBLE TO THE VIEWER."  

– WANG YAO-T’ING

Employing the visual language of drawing, Degen creates a series of paintings that take the viewer on a journey into the artist’s world. Inspired by Eastern and Western aesthetic, philosophical, musical, and esoteric traditions, Degen infuses his work with a metaphysical aura that visually articulates humanity’s inextricable connection to the earth. The artist uses various materials and techniques to transform the composition from intuition to a rich expression of the pleasures of the natural world intensified by the visual pleasures of paint.

Each image begins with a drawing. After sketching multiple iterations of the subject in pencil, Degen renders the composition with pen and ink on Khadi paper. The Indian handmade paper crafted from recycled rags has a surface that varies greatly in texture and density. The precision of Degen’s study must adjust and accommodate the irregularity of the paper- intentional gestures give way to the material demands of the surface as his ideas take concrete form.  He moves quickly, cutting and collaging the paper as he draws, “these are small drawings so things can happen very fast. Complexity builds quickly. Things get worked, or overworked or unworked, but very fast. It needs to be quick because my intuition can be impetuous, and I need to just trust it and follow it at whatever pace it is moving.” Degen dashes, dots, and strokes an image into material reality with meticulous fervor. 

Consider Longshore (Day) and Longshore (Night), depictions of  a woman at dusk and a man at dawn.  While the artist's palette may appear limited there are in fact many layers of underpainting that work in tandem to conjure the glow of a sunrise or the silvery light at dusk. The artist composes the figures as mirror opposites: yin and yang, two faces of a coin. The figures recline in the same relaxed attitude, their juxtaposition suggesting a state of dynamic fluidity rather than fixed duality.

"EACH MARK HOLDS GESTURE. EVERYTHING IS IN THE GESTURE. FROM ITS BEGINNING AS POTENTIAL, THEN AS IT BECOMES A THOUGHT IN THE MIND; THEN A MOVEMENT IN THE BODY; THEN IN THE BRUSH AND THE INK OR THE PAINT. EACH MARK IS A SMALL SECTION OF A LARGER CONTIGUOUS ARC: A LINE THAT EXTENDS FROM WHAT CAN  BE SEEN TO WHAT CANNOT BE SEEN, CONNECTING PART TO WHOLE AND FINITE TO INFINITE."

 - BENJAMIN DEGEN