New Virtual Art Exhibit – Communion by Benjamin Winans
Explanation:
Exhibited at First Presbyterian Church is a sculpture titled Phantom Limb, and is a part of Benjamin Winans’ Master of Fine Arts thesis shown on display at Stamps Gallery March 12 - May 2nd. It is part of a broader body of work in which Winans reimagines symbols of American Christianity and nationalism - a pew, a flag, the notion of monument. He takes these apart and puts them back together in new ways that expose misinterpretations and historical undercurrents that are often in opposition to Biblical tenets of grace, forgiveness, redemption, and reconciliation. The artworks test relationships between patriotic, sacred, and often violent power structures in American political culture and Christianity. In this way, he also tests his own relationship to the symbols with the hope that the investigation will provide proof that there is room for truth, justice, and change in this broken world.
Bio:
Benjamin Winans (b. 1987, Raleigh, NC) is an installation artist, printmaker, and scholar whose work addresses the intersection of evangelical Christianity and American culture, faith and doubt, and the search for grace and redemption. He graduated in 2018 with a BFA in Painting and Printmaking from Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, VA. Winans has exhibited nationally and internationally, including a solo show at Gallery Edit in Richmond as well as group shows in Richmond, Ann Arbor, MI, Providence, RI, Wichita, KS, Lucknow, India and Tokyo, Japan. His work has been published in Studio Visit Magazine and was featured on the cover of VCU’s Amendment Literary Journal in their 2016 Annual. The following year, he was the recipient of the John Roos Memorial Scholarship for artists working in the humanities. He is currently living with his wife and two cats in Ann Arbor, MI where he is finishing his MFA at Stamps School of Art & Design at the University of Michigan.