On painting

Snow, benda 2008

I paint because as Eckhart Tolle so eloquently said. “All we can perceive, experience, think about is the surface layer of reality,
less than the tip of the iceberg.”

The Journey

benda 2006

Painting is the process of eliminating all that I understand. It is the unpeeling of all the layers of my thoughts and images to find the most basic forms that reveal the simplest truths.

Acceptance

Jim Dine
I have come to terms with a lot of things, because, when all's said and done, there's really very little one can do about a lot of things. You just accept them. The point is you just have to keep on working and you just have to keep on living. (Jim Dine)

Responsibility

Oskar Kokoschka

I consider myself responsible to the coming generations, which are left stranded in a blitzed world, unaware of the soul trembling in awe before the mystery of life. (Oskar Kokoschka)

Why we do what we do

Keith Haring
The best reason to paint is that there is no reason to paint....I'd like to pretend that I've never seen anything, never read anything, never heard anything...and then make something....Every time I make something I think about the people who are going to see it and every time I see something, I think about the person who made it....Nothing is important...so everything is important."
~ Keith Haring (June 15, 1986 NYC)

The struggle

earth day 2009 benda
encaustic on wood

The artist struggle is universal. Every artist can identify with it. It makes no difference if you produce a masterpiece or not. It is part of the process. Perhaps that is how we are all alike. United in our angst.

Subject matter

Georgia O'Keeffe
Objective painting is not good painting unless it is good in the abstract sense. A hill or a tree cannot make a good painting just because it is a hill or a tree. It is lines and colors put together so they say something. Georgia O'Keeffe