“Boxed In.” All images © Benjamin Sack, shared with permission
In Benjamin Sack’s imagined environments, it’s not uncommon to find angular mazes resembling dystopian structures, buildings packed so closely together it’s difficult to distinguish one from the next, and labyrinthine walkways that spiral like fractals. Working in pen and ink, the artist (previously) draws intricate black-and-white metropolises that waver between organization and chaos: He plays with geometry, angles, and dimension to render perplexing maps teeming with both traditional architecture and surreal additions, like treble clefs, astral shapes, and dizzying line- and dot-work.
While many of Sack’s works meld the past, present, and future into a single display, his recent feet-wide maze titled “Roots of Being (Per Aspera ad Astra)” is directly drawn from this last year. “This piece was a massive, Daedalian undertaking that was started at the outset of the initial lockdowns back in March 2020 and finished upon my receiving the first dose of the vaccine in April,” the artist tells Colossal. “A large labyrinth emblematic of the epoch we persevered.”
Watch the timelapse video below and head to Instagram for a glimpse into Sack’s process, and pick up a print in his shop.
“Tokyo, Japan”
“Roots of Being (Per Aspera ad Astra)”
Detail of “Roots of Being (Per Aspera ad Astra)”
“Manhattanesque”
Detail of “Leitmotif”
“Endurance”
“Acoustaglyph”
“A Sensitive Chaos”
“Leitmotif”