Anna Hendrick Karpatkin Benjamin

My time at Dieu Donne as the West Bay View Foundation Fellow marked a pivotal evolution in my work as an artist, shifting my practice from works ON paper to works OF paper. Collaborating in the studio with Amy and Tatiana has pushed my understanding of not only how a medium can serve the subject of an artwork, but how the material itself can beget the content.

As the inaugural West Bay View Fellowship recipient, Anna Hendrick Karpatkin Benjamin joined us at Dieu Donné in September 2018. Studio access, funding, and mentorship allowed Benjamin to focus solely on her artistic practice and work as an educator. The artist shares her fellowship experience through a short Q & A below.

What did this fellowship offer?

This fellowship opened up so many new ways of working, as each artist that I worked with approached the papermaking process and materials in their own way. Working in such a busy New York based studio meant adopting lots of skill at working quickly and successfully adapting my knowledge base to each artist and their individual ways of working. The development in my own work was incredible, helping me think of representing space WITHIN the paper, rather than on the surface. The constant collaboration with artists (through the professional and education studios) has evolved my teaching approaches immensely, particularly in adapting a huge range of material/process possibilities to support a specific artist or artwork.

What artists did you work with during your fellowship? 

Sue Gosin, Nate Lewis, Eliza Kentridge, Michele Oka Doner, Susan Hamburger, Joan Hall and Glenn Goldberg, and so many more through the education programming!

What papermaking techniques were new or most exciting to you?

Blowouts! But really any technique that allowed me to cut stencils. The myriad of ways to use hand cut stencils to produce different types of images was particularly exciting: painting with linen pulp paints through a stencil, blowouts through a stencil, and painting through cut lines with pigment (like we did with Eliza Kentridge and Sue Gosin, where the lines bleed a bit).


Who was your Master Collaborator and what did you learn from them?

Amy was my studio collaborator, though I learned so much from both her and Tatiana. Coming from a printmaking background, I’m used to being very organized and methodical in the studio. Amy especially encouraged me to learn through experimenting with the pulp. I had an idea of what I wanted to achieve during my studio days, particularly how to represent an architectural facade with its interior, in a way where both could be experienced simultaneously by the viewer. Before this fellowship, I would have planned everything ahead of time and simply produced once I got into the wet studio. Once I was in the studio with Amy, we experimented with all the possible ways of making these different layers come together into a single image. Working repeatedly through all the possible arrangements, I was able to learn more about the work THROUGH making it. While so much of my learning previously came through my drawing processes, this major shift allowed me to work more directly with the pulp as a medium, responding to its own interactions with my hand and stencils. Moving away from the studio as a place of production, to a place of exploration and learning through action.

How did your own working process change in the studio?

The ability to use my stencils in so many different ways in the wet studio helped me understand cutting not just as a final action, but as an integral part of any piece at an earlier stage.

What else did you explore during your fellowship?

I was able to experiment more with recycling cut papers from previous projects, learning to beat recycled kozo fibers on my own, problem solving issues as they arose. I also wanted to experiment with the 3 dimensional quality of paper, using  woodcut carvings to combine laminate casting kozo sheets with stencil pulp paintings. Still a study in process...

How did you benefit from access to the Community Studio?

In addition to allowing me to learn and create independently in a papermaking studio (for the first time), the Community Studio allowed me to produce an edition for Hand Papermaking magazine’s Portfolio #13 “In Between”. I had never editioned before in handmade paper, so creating 127 pieces was a huge mental and physical task. As I didn’t receive a formal education in handmade paper, completing this project in the Community Studio became an essential way of studying the medium in a more intensive way.

Bonding with other Community Studio members, interns and former staff was incredible. I’ve always loved working in a shared studio, and the opportunity to work side-by-side with other artists helps us all learn and grow.

About the Artist

Born and raised in New York City, Anna Hendrick Karpatkin Benjamin currently lives and works out of her home studio in Philadelphia, PA. Beginning her arts education at LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts, she continued at Haverford College where she received a B.A. in Fine Art (Printmaking) and Education. After teaching in museums, schools and community art centers in the Philadelphia area, Benjamin went on to receive an M.F.A. in Printmaking from the Rhode Island School of Design. She utilizes print, drawing and hand cut papers to construct spaces through pattern, repetition and ritual. In addition to her personal practice, Benjamin is the Lead Organizer of Prints for Protest, a collaborative portfolio project raising funds for communities at risk. Her work has been exhibited in New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Japan.

For more information, please visit her website: https://www.annabenjamin.com/

Additional Links:

Anna Hendrick Karpatkin Benjamin, Dieu Donné Press Release for "Boi v’Shalom - Come in Peace”