Meet Benjamin Brockman

Today we’d like to introduce you to Benjamin Brockman.

Benjamin, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I’ve been drawing things and making things since I could sit up. I grew up in a creative family – my dad and mom were both in theater, as well as my uncle, so there was always a lot of creativity and praise for creative achievements at home, and I guess that’s where it started.

But I guess you could say my first passion wasn’t really art – it was storytelling. I was really captured by stories at a young age and that’s a big through-line to what I do today. I tend to think in terms of allegories, metaphors, and symbols – and I think that kind of thinking has just always helped me understand the world around me. I’ve always been more comfortable with visual language than written or verbal language, especially as I’ve grown up and had difficulties feeling like I was understood or belonged.

I didn’t realize I had attention deficit disorder until I was in my 30s, and I was already in graduate school at that point, and it’s not useful to think of how things might’ve been different if I’d known earlier – but in a lot of ways that struggle has made me the artist and person I am today. The depression and stuff – my life has grown around it, and I try to take opportunities to pay that forward. Matisse said it well: “I am unable to distinguish between the feeling I have for life and my way of expressing it.”

I always knew I was slightly different than my peers – my interests were always darker; I was less afraid to confront difficult truths about the world – but I had some demons I had to do battle with, and my art is as much about that as anything else. It still is. It may appear to be about the environment – or lots of other things, but like all stories, it’s about making sense of where I fit as a human being. Where we ALL fit.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
It’s never been smooth, and I don’t expect it ever will be. I have had some dark periods in my life but making art has always been restorative and redeeming for me. It is something that feels good and right and fills me with a certain practical (and wildly impractical) sense of purpose. Of course, a lot of artists I know have the same struggles at some point – any of my close friends who are creators have had to find a way to make it work with all the other demands of life. People often decry monetizing hobbies, but I think it’s equally problematic to expect people to minimize their passions and fit them in in the hidden corners of the rat race. Every artist I know needs help and needs to be elevated.

You walk around major cities, and you see art – public art, and it’s always by the same artists, again and again – already established successful artists and the little guys can never catch a break. It’s very dispiriting to constantly apply to things and see those projects go to artists who are already very well represented and established. I love sticker culture because I love that slap-ups fly in the face of that. Whatever your philosophy is – if you are an artist, even the most well-meaning art organizations pit artists against each other.

The street is one place where the playing field is level. There is a certain meritocracy, but it’s vastly more appealing than competing or waiting in line for a space on the wall of a coffee shop. It can be a tough thing and there are always periods of self-doubt, comparison, failure – but hell if you are an artist, you might have picked the single hardest thing to be successful at. The practice of adjusting your idea of success is what will keep you doing it.

I think another thing that happens, that I’ve just recently become aware of, is how difficult it is to market yourself in today’s climate. Social media has figured out how to simultaneously commoditize the work of artists and still limit their exposure unless it’s paid for through advertising. None of the best artists I know have the time or money to hire assistants or be plugged into social media all day trying to beat algorithms.

But I don’t want to sound bitter. I absolutely see what I do and where I am as a privilege. I used to think I’d like to be able to take art as seriously as a doctor does medicine, or a lawyer does the law – I see now how fortunate it is that the impractical nature of what I do is exactly why it is so important, and the right people will always be turned on by that. Even if after I’m dead or something. I guess I’m saying I struggle with many parts of my creative process – my muse, my energy, my motivations, and mostly my ambitions, but art is about problem-solving to me.

It kind of finds its way to light in unexpected and even undesirable ways – but if I do what it is that I do, and do it authentically, everything just sorts of works out. It kind of finds its way to light in unexpected and even undesirable ways – but if I do what it is that I do, and do it authentically, everything just sorts of works out.

What are you most proud of? Is there anything else we should know about what you do?
Honestly, the thing I am most proud of is that I’m still doing it. Lots of very talented artists I have known over the years let go of it when they had kids or found a career path. I’m still doing what I can – I’m halfway through INKtober and I’m proud that I’m even making a small drawing every day or so. I have a family and a full-time job and I just flat out don’t have much mental energy at the end of the day. That’s been a real hardship for me – by the time I can sit down to create something I’m already dead on my feet.

But to take it further, the things I’m proudest of aren’t really related to my ambitions as an artist anymore. They were for a long time, and it made the setbacks insufferable. I try to focus on the things that inspire me and make me feel connected to other people. As a depressive introverted type that can be hard – but I’ve grown to learn that the more connected and supported I feel the better I feel about everything, including what I make.

That’s a real poke in the eye to the romantic ideas a lot of people have about artists (admittedly even my own) – but honestly, my work improves when I’m happy. So, I work on that first. That comes from being a dad, a husband, and giving back to the community. I currently work in Behavioral Health and it’s a tough gig – but it helps me feel plugged into the community I live in in a meaningful way.

I think this question wants me to say “I’m a printmaker and a painter who does the mutant bunnies and apocalypse stuff” – and if I’m ever widely known for that, that’s cool. I make prints, drawings, paintings, doodads, sculptures, and I’ve dabbled with puppetry and video. But I’m at a point where I’d rather be known for any of the other stuff I mentioned above.

What do you like best about our city? What do you like least?
The way the natural and man-made world collide in the desert is endlessly fascinating to me. I love living in an urban environment but still somehow feel like I’m in the middle of nowhere. I’ve always gravitated toward places with rich histories, and the visibility of the history here is really interesting, especially in older areas of town.

I love the diversity of the landscape – the whole ecology. It’s so interesting how life still flourishes in extreme heat – it’s a living testimony to the resilience of nature. Of course, there is a limit to that – which really does tie intrinsically to my artwork.

I think living near the mountains is very humbling. To get a visual reminder of how small you are every day, and to how vulnerable we are to the elements, it sort of keeps me “right-sized” in a way.

Contact Info:

• Email: benjamin@benjaminbrockman.com
• Website: www.benjaminbrockman.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/thesacredtrust/
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/TheSacredTrust
• Twitter: www.twitter.com/Brockchop
• Youtube: www.youtube.com/user/BDBrock25
• Other: www.patreon.com/benjaminbrockman

Image Credits
Benjamin Davis Brockman, The Sacred Trust Studio 2015-2021