Painting-Oil/Acrylic, 2D Design, Drawing

Originally from Nashville, Tennessee, Ben P. Norton spent nine years in Ohio before moving to Arizona in 2015. Ben received his BFA from the University of Dayton in 2009 with a concentration in Painting and a minor in Religious Studies. He spent the next four years painting and managing a gallery in the commercial art world before re-entering academia at the University of Cincinnati’s School of Design, Architecture, Art and Planning, where he received his MFA in May of 2015. Ben now teaches Painting, Drawing, and 2-D Design at Yavapai College’s Verde Valley Campus in Clarkdale, AZ.

For Ben, painting is a window, or rather creating a space in which a new reality can unfold. The painted figure comes closer to a sensual understanding of forms, pushing up to the realm of abstraction to find a point of convergence. Narrative, magic, and humor all find places in Ben’s paintings. New meanings and understandings can be awakened through color and form; in the words of Edward Hopper, “If I could say it in words there would be no reason to paint.”