John Benson

“Why does a modern young man practice the exacting, antique art of carving rocks? At thirty-six, Benson does it for love, money, and the ‘the old pleasure center—the sexual rush’ that comes with creating or contemplating something of rare beauty. He is quite serious about the Pleasure Center Principle, citing neurologists who say that both aesthetic excitement and sensual feeling occur in the same part of the human brain. He also quotes Veronese: ‘Given a large canvas, I enriched it as I saw fit.’”

Excerpt from interview with Johh E. Benson by Quest77 Magazine four decades ago.

— John E. Benson (b.1939)