Que des Femmes 2021

Delighted to have this work ‘Moving Between’ included in Factory 49 Sydney satellite exhibition of Que des Femmes.
Thanks to curators Lisa Pang and Anya Pesce and to initiators Roland Orepuk and Billy Gruner 
Congrats to the group of women artists exhibiting I so admire.

Factory 49’s satellite Que des femmes / Only women exhibition
Karen Benton Statement
‘Moving between’
My material manipulations reflect a personal language within the broad scope of non-objective art and foreground an interplay between form and process and between painting and sculpture. 
It’s impossible to be totally uninfluenced by the space you inhabit. My interests move between the urban architectural space, wellness and fashion rather than purely painting and manipulating materials and shapes or attempting to express the sublime. 
I assemble conventional materials alongside the more unconventional with choices determined by the materials’ intrinsic properties such as malleability and rawness. 
My work while non-objective is not entirely self-referential. Although it exists as an exploration of colour, shape, texture and form, the work also alludes to the emotional highs and lows we experience when moving between spaces of containment and freedom; between control and spontaneity and between the familiar and unknown.
As such, while the artwork ‘Moving Between’ is a non-objective work, it also reflects a choreographed event where spontaneity and process overlap with intention and form and intertwine with emotions and feelings.