The Open Gallery
Philippe Benichou
Obadapape
(1 of 9)
Philippe Benichou writes, "My work is for the most part expressive: abstract and abstract expressionist with an intense and free use of color. I use various media to produce unusual textures, shapes, compositions and color coordination.

"I too believe color has a primitive healing effect provided it contains and aims at harmony. I am interested in surprising dynamics, rhythms and relationships. I create series spontaneously based on techniques and ideas I have been subconsciously developing and refining over the years. Ideas seem to occur naturally as part of the process. Color and line engender shapes that eventually lead me to a harmony of composition, which I reckon is the ultimate purpose.

"I don’t lean toward representational work as I view the world as a dance of mirage like manifestations and appearances. My spirit has ways of seeing that my eyes cannot comprehend. I find soothing peace when I escape the world of accepted forms and favor expressing myself freely and openly. Creative imagination and spiritual reflection through the act of painting is the closest I get to formlessness without limits. To work with the un-interpreted, and yet engender clarity, freedom and consequently a dim but present sense of evolution.

"Painting to me IS thinking in action, profound and on all levels. Living in a political, delicate and sensitive world, I must participate in the process of completely consuming the atmospheres around me in order to process them artistically.

"My paintings are like books and maps. I 'write' so much in them. I journey like a guided vessel through rich internal experiences removed from the psychological babbling of the 'real' world."

Philippe Benichou's website