The Mage’s Pantry
Matthew Benedict
2008
Texts by Charles Beyer, Nayland Blake, and Oliver Zybok
Published by Hatje Cantz
Some of the seemingly nostalgic works by Matthew Benedict recall illustrations from old children’s books, with pirates, saints, and Freemasons recurrently populating his paintings, photographs, embroidered pieces, and sculptures. The quiet, beautiful, and yet uncanny dreamworld of his symbolic figures, and his allegorical references to literature or history, deliberately elude comprehension in the mind of the uninitiated observer. This is the first monograph to examine Benedict's entire oeuvre, as well as its references to illustrative and decorative conventions and techniques.