Irena Jurek interviews painter Trudy Benson whose work will be on view at Ribordy Contemporary, Geneva (March 23 – May 11) and Galerie Bernard Ceysson, Paris (March 24 – May 13).

Benson comments: “my work in the past had been so invested in digital media as a reference. It was an interesting enough idea for me to make many paintings in this series, but one of the many limitations was that in any discussion about the work, the physical act of painting seemed to fall by the wayside. This is heartbreaking. One of the reasons I fell in love with painting was the sensation of walking into a room and being able to smell the paint. Surface is so important to me for the same reason, there is a physical presence that is immediately apparent when you are actually in a space with a painting. I also enjoy using colors and color combinations that can’t quite be photographed the same way that our eyes see the color IRL. It’s almost a fetish to have so many sensory qualities in an essentially 2-D object, especially these days when almost anything can be experienced virtually. The idea that a painting, which at one time was a virtual experience, a window, can now be decidedly phenomenal is something that has driven the work for years.”