Trudy Benson

Trudy Benson (born 1985) is an American abstract painter who lives and works in Brooklyn, NY.

Early life and work Trudy Benson was born in Richmond, Virginia in 1985. She received a BFA from Virginia Commonwealth University in 2007 and an MFA from the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York in 2010.

Benson is known for her large scale abstract paintings that utilize large swaths and globs of paint. Her style was influenced by early computer painting programs, such as MacPaint and Microsoft Paint. and Post-War New York Abstraction. Related painters include Hans Hoffman, Jonathan Lasker, Al Held, and Keltie Ferris.

In May 2013, New York Times Art Critic Karen Rosenberg wrote that Benson's canvases resemble the proportions of early mac computers, and "mimic the squiggly, uncontrollable lines and seemingly miraculous instant color-fills of 1980s graphics programs like MacPaint." She went on to conclude, "There is a deliberate heaviness to her work, an impasto that no screen can yet evoke."