Charles Benefiel

Charles Benefiel (1967 - ) is a contemporary American outsider artist from California. As he has severe obsessive-compulsive disorder, almost all of his work is done via stippling. He currently lives in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Overview

Born in Venice Beach, California, Charles experienced a mental breakdown in 1997 and was urged by friends to go to a mental health center, where he was diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder. His work has since been featured in various psychiatry and art magazines. His art is generally done on a large scale, some pieces being up to 5 x 8 feet in size; he does most of his work through a neurotic method of stippling, without any preliminary designs. After the stippling is complete, the works are soaked in tea and treated with chemicals to give an old look.

Style and method

He renders his work through a process of stippling done with very precise rapidograph technical pens; his pieces are done without any preliminary drawings, and with no lines to guide the composition. In his representational drawings, Benefiel works from the center outward, and in his drawings of rows of numbers he stipples the characters from left to right as they would appear on a typed or printed page. As he draws, he counts the dots until a certain point, then repeats the sequence. Once the dots are complete, Benefiel tones the paper with tea, to add visual depth as well as a look of age. The idea of this method is to provide an exceptional degree of incremental control where possibilities for spontaneity and error are all but erased, to aesthetically resemble photographic grain, and to serve and complement his obsessive-compulsive disposition.

External links

• Overview and analysis of his work
• Collection of works
• Small Gallery of work
• American Folk Art Museum
• Franklin, Deeanna (December 2003). "The art of Charles Benefiel". Clinical Psychiatry News. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb4345/is_12_31/ai_n29052361/?tag=content;col1. 
• "Obsessive Drawing". Studio International. 29 November 2005. http://www.studio-international.co.uk/reports/obsessive_drawing.asp. 
• Artopia article