For his first solo exhibition at Meyer Kainer Will Benedict has invited Anita Leisz and Jutta Koether to design walls that would delineate discrete areas in which he could hang new paintings that are stamps and postcards, view finders and cameras as well as notices and bulletins. The show is based on „Egypted“, a group exhibition curated by Benedict at Kunsthalle Exnergasse in Vienna.

Outward Projection.

For the past few years Will Benedict has been painting, drawing and affixing various types of frames, windows and other orifices into the world while becoming more and more proficient and imaginative in assigning the frames properties of their own as well as personalizing them and their presence. The frames own systematic contribution to their varied contents became more demanding. At some point a change happened, a rift of consiousness, and his frames began to make demands on him and required satisfaction and fulfilment. Outwardly things remain the same. The images of the external world remain crude and artificial and as much in need of speculative analysis as before. Be that as it may the frames became aware that they where constructed as channels, as means of conveying something meaningful. With all their distortions they refused to be treated as transmitters of junk. Will felt as if some of his mind’s faculties and their by-products realigned themselves differently and began speaking back to him with a tough, self-confident voice. His work acquired a distinctly new mood. Like teenagers who leave their homes to become a part of an exciting youth movement, his new works seemed strangely serious and selfless, reflective of their circumstances and surroundings as much as with desires and inner inclinations of an individual mind. The transformation was exhilarating and therapeutic. A successful treatment of the symptoms of inner discontent with the use of outward projection. In the process Will found it easier to see himself as an element within a larger like minded group. I’ve heard Will say on more than one occasion that „sometimes an object’s history can be unfolded and sometimes the object enfolds you, takes over your body and you’re just a kind of zombie.” But he does admit that it’s mostly his fault if he ends up in this position, a bit mute, surrounded and a part of something. Or if he’s in an empowered position, he says that’s his fault too.
Text: Martin Guttmann