Denita Benyshek
In 2022, the OpenStudios project selected Denita Benyshek as the artist-in-residence for Botanica Gardens in Wichita, Kansas. After living in the Cascade Mountains, Denita had recently moved back to Wichita with her son, Hans.
In the mountains, their home was surrounded by a lush garden, created by Benyshek over 25 years. Around their new home, the yards were starkly bare.
Hans is disabled, always suffering from pain, with difficulty walking. He wanted to sit outside, in a garden, to enjoy nature. He asked, “Mom, can we please have a garden?” As he underwent a series of surgeries, Benyshek began creating a garden around their new home.
In back, she planted a cottage garden, dense with flowers, and, in front, a xeriscape prairie garden with ornamental grasses and sunflowers. Her son can relax in the shade, writing, reading, and listening to birds sing while chatting with neighbors.
In the morning, while her son slept, Denita would go into the garden, enjoying a cup of coffee, moment of peace, and a break from the stresses of caring for her son. Inspired by the garden’s beauty, she began a series of small-scale paintings, using watercolor, ink, and gouache. Rarely mixing pigments, she uses overlapping veils of luscious colors.
At Botanica, Denita realized that she was more interested in depicting individual plants and intimate views, rather than capturing the grand sweep of the 17-acre garden. She also learned that she prefers the light quality in the morning and evening, those liminal hours when shadows are deeper and light falls at an angle.
Denita’s paintings convey the magic of the garden. Her paintings offer experiences of ecstatic beauty, respite in a healing sanctuary, and an awareness of life as emergent and transformative.
ARTIST BIO:
A lifetime of transformative experiences is integrated and represented in Benyshek’s artwork. Born in a rural Czech immigrant community in northern Kansas, Benyshek felt kinship with the remnants of animism and folk beliefs. Her family’s farms, gardens, and frequent camping trips nurtured an intimate relationship with the natural world – her place of inspiration, awe, and wonder.
Benyshek earned a BFA (Wichita State University) and an MFA (University of Washington) in painting. Benyshek attended the Pilchuck Glass School on a full scholarship and was an artist-in-resident at the Ucross Foundation, Wyoming. During the years of part-time teaching in the Alaskan bush, she found her artistic voice, developing an intuitive, visual language akin to the Slavic perception of reality, richly layered, visionary, with nonlinear time, reverie provoking discontinuous space, and a belief in a transcendent power of beauty.
With motherhood, Benyshek decided to develop a second career that would provide financially for her child. She earned an MA in psychology, a graduate certificate in the psychology of creativity, and a PhD in humanistic and transpersonal psychology. Her research focuses on contemporary artists as shamans, with publications in the USA, UK, Poland, and Hungary.
In 2018, the “mansin” (master of 1000 spirits) Kim Junghee and her two shaman assistants travelled from South Korea to initiate me through a traditional “Naerim Gut.”
Since initiation, I daily say a prayer that calls into me the spirits of the sky, mountains, prairie, earth, and cosmos. In this creative practice, I serve as a channel for these nature-inspired works as gifts to the viewer. I was led by a research question: “How do I visually represent my visionary experiences of nature in a way that can be shared with my audience?”
In 2022, Benyshek moved her family to Wichita, returning to her roots. She was selected as the artist in residence for Botanica Gardens through the OpenStudios project and also began creating a new garden around her home. Those garden watercolors led to the recent Sacred Geometry series, a means of representing her intimate, mystical relationship with nature.
Public Art Collections:
University of Washington Medical Center
Harborview Medical Center
King County Ethnic Heritage Collection
Glasmuseet (Glass Museum), Ebeltoft, Denmark
Snoqualmie Point Park
Selected Solo Exhibits:
Hope Collection, Santa Fe, NM
University of Alaska, Anchorage, AK
Gallery Oscar, Sun Valley, ID
Anderson Glover, Kirkland, WA
Bell Gallery, Seattle, WA
Bruskin Gallery, Pt. Townsend, WA
Century II, Wichita, KS
Selected Group Exhibits:
Bellevue Museum of Art, WA
Whatcom Museum of History and Art, WA
Harvester Arts, Wichita, KS
Viridian Artists, Chelsea, New York City, NY
Cerbera Gallery, Kansas City, MO
Yakima Valley Museum, WA
Coos Bay Museum, OR
Philabaum Gallery, Tucson, AZ
Redefining Visionary Art, Doma Gallery, SOHO, NY, juror Suzi Gablik
Mulvane Art Center, Topeka, KS
Museum of Fine Arts, Owensboro, KY
Salina Art Center, Salina, KS
Corvallis Art Center, OR
Washington Center, Olympia, WA
Center on Contemporary Art, Seattle, WA
Ulrich Museum of Art, Wichita, KS
Museum of NW Art, La Conner, WA
American Art Gallery, Tacoma, WA
Citizens Cultural Center, Fujinomiya, Japan
