Ben Webb (artist)
Encyclopedia
Benedict Webb (born 1977) is a Dunedin
, New Zealand
-born artist, dividing his time between working in New Zealand and Germany. He is the son of New Zealand artist Marilynn Webb.
Working largely with a mixture of oil and metallic pigments, Webb's work takes old photographs as its starting-point. His images are frequently portraits from Weimar Germany in the years preceding World War II, though he has also used still lifes as subject matter. These photographic images are recreated in large format, then distressed by the addition of pigment to form works which evoke strong reactions of melancholy or nostalgia, both in terms of their subject matter and their treatment. His work has been compared to the "gaudily tragic" expressionist art of the Weimar era, with portraits of " figures whose faces seem to express the unbearable heaviness of a past trapped behind their eyes."
His earlier hand painted works are now very collectable but are very hard to find.
Dunedin
Dunedin is the second-largest city in the South Island of New Zealand, and the principal city of the Otago Region. It is considered to be one of the four main urban centres of New Zealand for historic, cultural, and geographic reasons. Dunedin was the largest city by territorial land area until...
, New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
-born artist, dividing his time between working in New Zealand and Germany. He is the son of New Zealand artist Marilynn Webb.
Working largely with a mixture of oil and metallic pigments, Webb's work takes old photographs as its starting-point. His images are frequently portraits from Weimar Germany in the years preceding World War II, though he has also used still lifes as subject matter. These photographic images are recreated in large format, then distressed by the addition of pigment to form works which evoke strong reactions of melancholy or nostalgia, both in terms of their subject matter and their treatment. His work has been compared to the "gaudily tragic" expressionist art of the Weimar era, with portraits of " figures whose faces seem to express the unbearable heaviness of a past trapped behind their eyes."
His earlier hand painted works are now very collectable but are very hard to find.