Ben Sanderson

Ben Sanderson holds a BFA from Falmouth University, and in 2017 took part in Syllabus III, a roaming study programme partnered with Wysing Arts Centre, Studio Voltaire, Eastside Projects, Iniva, New Contemporaries, S1 Artspace, and Spike Island.

Selected exhibitions include: Bridge the Tamar, MIRROR, Plymouth (2023); Exeter Contemporary Open, Exeter Phoenix, Exeter (2023); Thanks For the Apples, Falmouth art Gallery, Cornwall (2022); Your Foot in My Face, Kingsgate Project Space, London (2021); Green at an Angle, Kestle Barton, Cornwall (2021); Chicken Nuggets, Pool School Gallery, Cornwall, (2019); Can We Still Be Friends?, Guest Projects, London (2018); ‘What is this place?’, Newlyn Art gallery and the Exchange (2017) and Smile orange, Cubitt Gallery, London (2016).

Sanderson has had a studio at CAST (Helston) since 2013 and has been closely involved with the development of the organisation from the start, as well as contributing to CAST’s ongoing Programme of public events.

In the past few years, he has worked with Pool School Gallery, CAST-Off and many other independent projects, including work with dementia patients and with young people. In 2021 he was commissioned by Hospital Rooms to make a new work for Bethlam Mother and Baby unit, London and in 2023 for Cove Ward, Redruth.

In February 2019 – February 2021 Ben had a residency at Trebah Gardens on the Helford River. During his time at Trebah, he organised a series of garden walks with specialists (an ethnobotanical researcher, gardeners, a psychiatrist, a herbalist, artists, poets, and friends) and they discussed in depth the space between people and plants. These conversations went on to inform his work in the studio and have left him still questioning what happens at the garden’s edge

These interests evolved through his working process where images and forms come and go, and systems are interrupted. Ben works in painting, drawing and textiles, often returning to, transforming or recycling old work. Monotypes on paper are developed and echoed in printed elements that appear on canvas. Canvas is sewn and patched back together or mulched to become rag paper, which in turn becomes a ground for new painting.