Steven Cox interviews painter Trudy Benson.

Benson discusses her process including working from digital sketches. She comments: “I use the most basic digital imaging program that came with my studio computer – a P.C. – to make sketches which I use as guides for certain parts of my paintings. I don’t really plan out my paintings from the beginning, though. MS Paint and other basic digital imaging software are more of an inspiration than a tool. The paintings first manifest themselves as a simple idea, or jumping off point, usually about effect. From there, experiments with application and technique lead to an improvisational process in the studio. The reference to MS Paint is definitely intentional; however, it revealed itself to be an inspiration through the process of making paintings with different paints and applications of paint. I believe the first abstract works I consciously made were on an old Macintosh SE using the MacPaint software, so I kind of discovered that when I finally moved into abstraction I was using similar materials as the virtual toolbox and even collaging paint elements in a similar way.”