

Exhibition
Somewhere, Somewhere
Artist:Hannah Benassi
Curator:Hu Yihang
Academic Director:Tingzhi Zhang
2022.05.27- 2022.07.20
ARCH PROJECT will present the experimental PROJECT “Somewhere, Somewhere” on May 27. This is the first solo exhibition of artist Hannah Benassi in China with ARCH PROJECT.
Hannah Benassi’s paintings are journeys running away. These journeys are condensed in abstract slices of her work that mirror each other through overlapping, weaving a random structural aesthetic.
The artist was inspired by the interaction between nature and human-made objects observed during her travels – the morphological changes in the surface of the wall caused by the passage of time. After decades or even hundreds of years, these man-made objects are alternately worn by wind, rain and sun, and the surface becomes fragile and turns up or falls off – a rhythmic layer is constructed. “Art must be natural in order to move people.” (Starting from feeling, Chen Jiaying) Hannah captures the structure of nature and architectural details in the spirit of naturalism, and relives her travel memories on soft materials according to its reflection.
Hannah’s work has a resort-like clarity that doesn’t float or sink. Although acrylic is Hannah’s primary painting material, printed collages, clay, cloth and rice paper also shape the work’s overall aesthetic — a delicate balance between transparency and heaviness.
In Hannah’s paintings, the historical traces shaped by natural and human-made landscapes are subtly preserved by her brushwork. Based on an intuitive layered construction of materials, her work archives the emotion that belongs to a certain location through an abstract combination of subtle turns of colour, scratched surfaces and patchwork.
History is not form, but only content. (Estetica I-Teoria, Benedetto Croce) Human life cannot be as long as the objects Hannah depicted, but one can feel the time condensed on objects. Hannah records memories of distant locations, memories that do not belong to an individual, but to certain locations. Nonetheless we don’t experience it in person, the record is sometimes more journey-worthy than the experience.
About the artist
Hannah Benassi (B.1997) is a Scottish abstract painter based in Edinburgh. Since graduating in Fine Art (2019) with a First-Class BA Honors Degree from Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design, Benassi continued her creative studies at GSA and Glasgow University where she received a distinction in Contemporary Curatorial Practice (2020). Benassi has been awarded the Farquhar Reid Trust prize and was nominated as Saatchi Arts Rising Star (2019). With her practice based in Scotland, her work has been exhibited across the UK and Portugal and continues to exhibit her paintings internationally. Recent exhibitions that showcased Benassi’s work from 2021 onwards includes, ‘MARS BLUEBERRIES’ with PADA Studios (Barreiro), ‘Abstract Zeitgeist’ with Rafiki Gallery (Edinburgh) and ‘Beyond Boundaries’ with TATHA Gallery (Newport-On-Tay).
- somewhere, somewhere exhibition, photo by ARCH GALLERY.
- somewhere, somewhere exhibition, photo by ARCH GALLERY.
- somewhere, somewhere exhibition, photo by ARCH GALLERY.