Receiving the £10,000 bursary would allow me to dedicate significantly more time to my painting practice. Like many artists, I balance my studio work with another job, and financial pressure inevitably limits the time and energy I can devote to developing my work. The bursary would primarily be used to cover studio rent, materials, and living costs, giving me the freedom to focus more on painting over the next year.
This period of increased focus would allow me to push my work further. I would not necessarily be keen on exploring new directions, I would much rather develop what I have now further. And sustained, uninterrupted time in the studio would be critical in allowing this.
Ultimately, the bursary would help me move my practice forward not through a radical change of course, but by making possible what artists most need: time, space, and stability to work.
I believe that the most meaningful way I can contribute to the creative profile of Darlington is by focusing fully on my own work and producing the strongest paintings I can. Rather than designing specific community initiatives, I would aim to show the results of sustained, serious studio practice — work that speaks for itself and invites reflection, dialogue, and connection.
I trust that genuine artistic commitment naturally enriches any community, not through extra programming, but through the work itself being present, visible, and alive.
Sociopolitical images circulate endlessly; they are appropriated, put in different contexts, cropped, edited, sent, misunderstood, and eventually lose their impact. We become accustomed to them, or they to us. The longer it is in circulation, the more it gets washed out until it becomes unclear where it came from and how it should be interpreted. It has moved away from its sociopolitical context and lost its context. It has become abstract.
This idea of the ‘exhausted image’ is central to my practice, combined with a related concept of ‘exhausted painting’. Recently, I have been using satellite imagery that has been digitally collaged and manipulated. These images were then cut into overlapping stripes and painted again multiple times, obstructing the image underneath. Similar to the exhausted image, the exhausted painting distances itself from its origin and moves into the space of art-historical abstraction, posing the question of when the connection between source and painting breaks.
Where the image is not obstructed, I build metal cages around it to protect these more sensitive, ‘unexhausted’, exposed images from the viewer’s gaze. Refracted and repeating like the audio recordings in Steve Reich’s musical compositions, the painting-hybrids dance between political and autonomous, readable and abstract, creating a delicate web of trauma. Recent exhibitions include Warbling, London, UK, Hypha Studios x Dispensary in Wrexham, Wales, LAAF_SetTheory in Łódź, Poland and MAP 11, Mamut Art Project, in Istanbul, Turkey.
Yes I have completed a Graduate Diploma from Chelsea College of Arts, UAL.
I have been awarded a residency in Łódź, Poland as the first resident at Pracownie Litery I Ynaklu. I was awarded this as a result from showing in LAAF_SetTheory, also in Łódź, Poland.
I am running an instagram broadcast channel with Sophie Nowakowska (professional_art_bullshitter) where we collect shows in London to make them more accessible in one place.
Yes I was selected at ArtConnects “Artists to Watch 2025 – Meet the Future: Three Emerging Artists Defining Contemporary Art in 2025”, “7 London Art Grads to See at the Shows” last year in FAD Magazine, as well as “Ben Grosse-Johannboecke – Interview – Artist of The Month” at PAI_32
Email: ben.grosse-johannboecke@outlook.com
Address: 8 Dog Kennel Hill, Apartment 13, London, SE22 8AA, GB
Local Authority: London Borough of Southwark
