Lara Sophie Benjamin

Lara Sophie Benjamin is a Cypriot artist born in Nicosia, Cyprus, where she is currently based. She is a painter who works primarily in oil paints.

Lara draws subject matter from her everyday surroundings and finds significant resonance in domestic spaces. She is interested in their experiential nature, subjective and selective readings, and the light and forms created within them.

Glimpses of interiors intrigue the artist – a partial peek at a room through a doorway or window that evoke a voyeuristic interest and fragmentation of space.

She sees the creative process as an intimate reaction to one’s reality. The outer world and the inner world come together on the canvas through the activity of painting. Familiar shapes meld with abstract elements, inviting the viewer to a deeper understanding of the ordinary.

Lara works intuitively and sees painting as an unending exploration based on formal and aesthetic qualities, particularly mark making.

The process for her is a constant balancing act, with a continual push and pull of opposing forces taking place on the canvas. The painter is constructing an image, while deconstructing it at the same time, attempting to find the point where all elements hold together, but are at the same time coming apart. During the act of making, the artist oscillates between using instinct and value
judgements, therefore existing somewhere between control and loss of control.

The artist has carried out projects in various countries, such as representing Cyprus as the invited International Artist at the distinguished Great Gulfcoast Arts Festival in Pensacola, Florida.

Her work has been exhibited in Cyprus, the UK, France, Italy and the United States, and is part of many private and public collections, including that of the National Collection of Cyprus, the Central Bank of Cyprus and the City of Pensacola, Florida.

ARTIST STATEMENT

Lara Sophie Benjamin is a painter who works primarily in oil paints. The artist draws subject matter from her everyday surroundings and finds a significant resonance in ordinary sights and spaces. She is interested in their experiential nature, subjective and selective readings and the light and the forms created within them.

Windows and doorways are of particular interest, with their liminal associations. They are transitional places, where time and action are suspended, where both the outside and inside are present.

Benjamin sees the creative process as an intimate reaction to the surrounding world based on one’s apperceptions. For her the outer world and the inner world come together on the canvas through her connection to her materials and the activity of painting. Familiar shapes lose their meaning and become part of a modified actuality.

Benjamin works intuitively and painting for her is an unending process of exploration and discovery based on formal and aesthetic qualities and on the versatility of paint.

Painting is a constant balancing act; a continual push and pull of opposing forces taking place on the canvas: The painter is constructing an image, but deconstructing it at the same time. Ideally, an image must hold together, while at the same time fall apart. Ambiguity in what one is looking at is always engaging – revealing information versus a lack of it. And during the process of making, the act of painting, the artist exists somewhere between control and loss of control – the dichotomy between knowing and not knowing.

BIOGRAPHY & EDUCATION

Lara Sophie Benjamin is a Cypriot artist born in Nicosia, Cyprus in 1987, where she is currently based.

MA Arts Practice, certification from University of East Anglia and University of Essex, completed at University Campus Suffolk, UK, 2013 – 2015

Associate Fellowship in Fine Art, Cyprus College of Art, Cyprus, 2009 – 2012

Foundation Diploma in Art and Design, Camberwell College of Arts, University of the Arts London, UK, 2008-2009

Her work has been exhibited in Cyprus, the UK and France, and is part of many private and public collections, including the National Collection of Cyprus and that of the Central Bank of Cyprus.