Richard Mead Atwater Benson (November 8, 1943 – June 22, 2017)[1] was an American photographer, printer, and educator who used photographic processing techniques of the past and present.[2][3]
Richard Mead Atwater Benson | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | Richard Mead Atwater Benson November 8, 1943 Newport, Rhode Island, U.S. |
| Died | June 22, 2017 (aged 73) Providence, Rhode Island, U.S. |
| Nationality | American |
| Other names | Chip (nickname) |
| Education | Brown University |
| Occupation | Photographer |
"He is perhaps best known for his innovations in photographic offset printing techniques and, later, ink-jet printing."[4]
Benson was awarded two Guggenheim Fellowships and a MacArthur Fellowship. His work is held in the collections of Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and Whitney Museum of American Art.
Biography
editBorn in Newport, Rhode Island, Benson attended the St. George's School, then spent three months at Brown University before dropping out and joining the United States Navy.[3][4][5][6][7] He learned about lenses and optics in his time in the navy.[6] He then worked as a printer, primarily in printing photographs, first in Connecticut and then in Newport.[6][7]
Benson began teaching photography at Yale University in 1979 and was dean of the Yale School of Art from 1996 to 2006.[3][4][5] Benson had a broad range of interests in the photographic print: aluminum,[3] silver, platinum, palladium, and ink.[4] Working in these different mediums, sometimes learning forgotten crafts and sometimes creating new ones, by the 1970s he was convinced that ink and the modern photo offset press—with its ability to make multiple passes that build an image from multiple layers of ink—possessed a potential for photographic rendition beyond anything else previously known. By the 1990s he began working on the relationship between the computer and traditional photographic imagery,[3] and applied the lessons from this in the production of long-run offset books of work by different photographers, in both black and white and color.[4]
He was the uncle of stone carver Nicholas Benson, the owner of The John Stevens Shop. Nick Benson was named a MacArthur Fellow in 2010, making the Bensons one of two families with multiple MacArthur fellows.[8]
Publications
edit- Lay This Laurel. Eakins, 1973. Co-authored with Lincoln Kirstein. ISBN 978-0871300362.
- Photographs from the Collection of the Gilman Paper Company. White Oak, 1985. OCLC 14377747. With acknowledgements by Howard Gilman, an introduction by Pierre Apraxine, notes to the plates by Lee Marks and an afterword by Benson. Benson made multiple halftone films from each photograph, exposed those films to plates, and printed the plates on a single-color sheet-fed offset printing press.
- A Maritime Album: 100 Photographs and Their Stories. Newport News, Virginia: Mariners' Museum; Yale University Press, 1997. Co-authored with John Szarkowski. ISBN 9780300073423.
- A Yale Album: The Third Century. A Yale Tercentennial Book. Yale University Press, 2001. ISBN 978-0300087239.
- The Printed Picture. Museum of Modern Art, 2008. ISBN 978-0870707216. Exhibition catalog of an eponymous 2016 exhibition at MoMA, co-curated with Peter Galassi.[9][10]
Awards
editHonors and awards given to him
edit- 1978: Guggenheim Fellowship, John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation[4][11]
- 1981: National Endowment for the Arts Photography Fellowship[12]
- 1986: MacArthur Fellowship, MacArthur Foundation[4][13]
- 1986: Guggenheim Fellowship, John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation[4][11]
- Two National Endowment for the Arts publication grants, Federal government of the United States[9]
- Rhode Island Governor's Medal for the Arts[6][9]
Honors and awards in honor of him
edit- Richard Benson Prize, Yale School of Art: annual prize awarded for leadership in the photography program[14][15][16]
Collections
editBenson's work is held in the following permanent collections:
- Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA: 3 prints (as of March 2019)[17]
- Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York: 70 prints (as of March 2019)[18]
- Museum of Modern Art, New York: 21 prints (as of March 2019)[19]
- San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA: 11 prints (as of March 2019)[20]
- Whitney Museum of American Art, New York: 8 prints (as of March 2019)[21]
References
edit- ^ Sandomir, Richard (June 27, 2017). "Richard Benson, Photographer and Printer, Dies at 73". The New York Times. Retrieved June 28, 2017.
- ^ Jobey, Liz (January 8, 2009). "In focus: Liz Jobey looks at the work of photographic printer Richard Benson". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved March 6, 2019 – via www.theguardian.com.
- ^ a b c d e "R.I.P., Richard Benson: Photographer, Printer, and Educator". petapixel.com. June 30, 2017. Retrieved March 6, 2019.
- ^ a b c d e f g h "In Memoriam: Remembering the Photographers We Lost in 2017". Time. Retrieved March 6, 2019.
- ^ a b "Yale University School of Art: Richard Benson". Yale University. Retrieved March 6, 2019.
- ^ a b c d "Richard M. A. Benson". The Newport Daily News. June 27, 2017. Retrieved May 12, 2021.
- ^ a b Papageorge, Tod (2017). "Benson In Memoriam". Yale School of Art. Retrieved May 12, 2021.
- ^ Jones, Malcolm (June 29, 2018). "Stone Carver Nick Benson Gives Eternity a Run for Its Money". The Daily Beast. Retrieved March 27, 2019.
- ^ a b c "Richard Benson (1943–2017)". Art Forum. June 23, 2017. Retrieved May 12, 2021.
- ^ Kuzma, Marta (June 26, 2017). "Benson In Memory Kuzma". Yale School of Art. Retrieved May 12, 2021.
- ^ a b "Richard M. A. Benson". John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. Retrieved January 1, 2019.
- ^ Conniff, Gregory; Panczenko, Russell (2006). Wild Edges: Photographic Ink Prints. Chazen Museum of Art (University of Wisconsin Madison). p. 159. ISBN 978-0-932900-99-9.
- ^ "Richard Benson – MacArthur Foundation". MacArthur Foundation. Retrieved January 1, 2019.
- ^ "Dannielle Bowman Wins 2020 Aperture Portfolio Prize". Art Forum. April 20, 2020. Retrieved May 12, 2021.
- ^ "ICP Extends "But Still, It Turns: Recent Photography from the World" Through August 15". International Center of Photography. April 14, 2021. Retrieved May 12, 2021.
- ^ "Annual Awards | Bulletin of Yale University". Yale Bulletin. Retrieved May 12, 2021.
- ^ "Richard Benson". Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Retrieved March 6, 2019.
- ^ "Search / Art". Metropolitan Museum of Art. Retrieved March 6, 2019.
- ^ "Richard Benson". The Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved March 6, 2019.
- ^ "Richard Benson · SFMOMA". San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Retrieved March 6, 2019.
- ^ "Richard Benson". Whitney Museum of American Art. Retrieved March 6, 2019.
External links
edit- "A Single Person Making A Single Thing" Calvin Tomkins, Profiles, The New Yorker, 1990
- "Richard Benson", View Camera, 1997
- "Richard Benson", Pace/MacGill Gallery
- The Printed Picture by Richard Benson, 2008
- Richard Benson Lectures at Yale (contains the full 8-hour video of Benson's lectures at MOMA discussing the various technologies presented in "The Printed Picture" exhibition)