Paul Benney

Paul Benney (born London, 30 May 1959) is a British artist who rose to international prominence as a contemporary artist whilst living and working in New York in the 1980s and later in the 90s in the UK as an award winning portraitist.

Benney’s work is held in the 20th century collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art,The Brooklyn Museum,The National Portrait Gallery, London and many prominent corporate and private collections around the world. Both Paul Benney’s portraiture and contemporary work have been featured on the BBC.

Benney's portrait subjects have included HM Queen Elizabeth II,Sir Mick Jagger,John Paul Getty III, Alexander Thynn, 7th Marquess of Bath, Lord Weidenfeld,Baroness Amos, The State Portrait for Israel, Lord Rothschild, as well as Ben Barnes for the portrait in the feature film ‘A Portrait of Dorian Grey’ in 2008. In 2015 Benney was commissioned by HRH Prince Charles paint WWII veteran Brian Stewart for the Royal Collection.

Paul Benney is a self-taught painter. He moved to New York in 1982 and was member of the N.Y. downtown Neo-Expressionist group in the 1980s. He was first taken by the P.P.O.W. Gallery in 1984 where he created immense monochromatic painting depicting mysterious dream imagery with surfaces built up of layers feather twigs, dirt and gel.

Benney’s East village contemporaries while living in New York included Kiki Smith, David Wojnarowicz, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Ross Bleckner, Richard Hambleton and Adam Fuss .

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