Benavides explores psychological repression and pharmaceutical drug abuse through the liberating chaos of visual arts. All his production contains a timeless factor that could perfectly place us in a Cobra group show.
With profound influences from abstract expressionism, Benavides embraces the gestural energy of the postwar movements of the mid-20th century. The closeness of subconscious automatic information is latent, to end up arranging the universe of each of his works.
There is an effervescence in his brush strokes that promise to lead us to a surprising evolution. We are before an artist who lives the process of his work while walking through his own life experience.
The message that his painting holds shows an imprisoned spirit that tries to tear down the walls of his own mind . Perhaps we are before a creator to whom art comes to translate, relieving the pain of recognizing oneself as a human being in dehumanized times.
"A painting is not an amalgamation of lines and colors: it is an animal, a night, a scream, a human being, and all of this at the same time."
Constant Nieuwenhuys.
Francisco Benavides, Santiago de Chile, 1998. Despite the fact that drawing and painting was never his main interest nor did he stand out in this field as a child, at the age of 17 he started showing skills that impressed those around him. He always admired the drawing ability of world-class artists , seeing exhibitions and works of art was his passion during adolescence and youth.
At the age of 19 he began to study visual arts at a University in Santiago de Chile, from where he was expelled for alcohol consumption. After this episode, when he turned 20, he was admitted for a month in a psychiatric unit where he was diagnosed with a psychotic disorder. This diagnosis would lead the treating psychiatrist to negligently over-medicate him, Benavides suffered what he defines as "a coma for 4 years".
At the age of 24, he changed psychiatrist and thereby escaped from the hell of antipsychotic over medication. He finally managed to return to his passion by starting a degree in visual arts at a new university.Benavides was a member of the Dardo workshop of the artists Raimundo Edwards and Ernesto Zamora. He also studied with the prominent Chilean artist Ignacio Gumucio. His work receives a variety of influences: Christopher Wool, Richard Prince, Damien Hirst, Basquiat and Andy Warhol, amongst others.
"My favorite artist by far is Picasso, who I consider the Maradona of painting."
Francisco Benavides originally spent long hours working inside his workshop. Today he lies on the bed and writes down the ideas that come to his head. Then he develops them and finally materializes them in his bursting works.