(Cazenovia, NY – June 2013) Stone Quarry Hill Art Park announced recently its summer exhibition, “William Benson Abstracting Realism.” The exhibition, sponsored by Jim and Pamela McDonough and The Pluff Hooley Black Group at Morgan Stanley, will run from Thursday, June 13, through Sunday, July 28, in the John and Virginia Winner Memorial Art Gallery.
The gallery is open Thursday through Sunday from noon to 5 p.m. or by appointment.
An opening reception will be held from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Thursday, June 13. The reception is open to the public.
Benson, who lives with his wife Sadie in Ithaca, graduated from the School of Fine Arts at Cornell University in 1972. Now a nationally recognized artist, he paints portraits, landscape and still life in oil and charcoal. He has painted more than 300 portraits and, over the last 20 years, he has been striving to incorporate abstraction into representational aspects of landscape and still life.
Although the art world was in the grip of neo-abstract expressionism during the early stages of his career, Benson chose to immerse himself in the inherent power of abstraction, as well as technical understanding of the great representational artists throughout history.
“Early on, I realized I had a skill and proclivity to draw both people and things,” Benson said. “I became proficient at portraiture and have been able to sustain my family doing that during the last 30 years. In the meantime, I found a way to marry the power of abstraction and realism in conveying the beauty of our upstate landscape. This is a beautiful place where we live, and I have a passion to capture it.”
Benson’s work has been shown in the Rochester Memorial Art Museum, The Arnot Museum in Elmira, The Johnson Museum at Cornell University, as well as dozens of galleries and shows throughout the United States. His work is collected both nationally and internationally.
Jennifer Schutzendorf, Benson’s representative and the exhibition’s guest curator, describes Benson’s paintings as ‘precise yet bold; daring and as energetic as he.’
“I can’t wait for people to experience Benson’s unparalleled skill for portraiture alongside his passion for the landscape,” Schutzendorf said. “The realism in his work, often alongside abstracted elements, creates an interesting dialogue that I want people to experience.”
Benson has donated a painting to the Art Park, which will be raffled at the end of the exhibition. Raffle tickets will be available to purchase at the opening reception, in the gallery or through the Art Park office and website.