“Ultimately, I’m engaged in a process of sense & worldmaking, attempting to better understand the systems, structures & ecologies I exist within, in order to critique & augment those fields as well as my position within them.”

about

“The parrallels between artistic & occult practice are obvious to me and I am fascinated by the potential these practices typify, in drawing that which is yet-to-be-perceived, into the observable world. I understand such parallels as explicit links between not only occult & artistic workings, yet also neurodivergent and queer(ed) experiences & expressions of life. All are processes of manifesting something-not-yet-here/known. I revel in these processes and how they may be extrapolated, forging alternative ways of being in & co-creating our world(s).”

Benjamin Sebastian (1980 AUS/GB) is a trans-disciplinary visual artist and curator living in London (U.K.). Their work spans performance, sculpture, curation, video, text, installation, drawing, textiles & new media - rooted in processes of bricolage, assemblage, collage, ritual & D.I.Y. cultural production.

Their touring exhibition; Holding The Shadow While Calling Back The Light, launched in September 2024 with an inaugural showing at Herbert Read Gallery (Canterbury) and is currently showing at CT20 Folkestone (1st Nov - 1st Dec 2024). Additional exhibition dates for the 2025 tour season will be announced shortly.

Through harmonizing nonbinary perspectives, neurodivergent cognition and decolonial practices, Sebastian weaves nascent narratives into existence, offering alternative ways of remebering, being here-and-now, and charting pathways to futures yet formed.

Sebastian proposes their work might be imagined as: “... a constellation of mirrors; reflecting aspects of the body, times, spaces & relationships I (have) inhabit(ed) - or - as world-making experiments, manifested through intuitive, erotic and esoteric methodologies.”

Sebastian is a champion of the artist-led sector having co-founded both ]performance s p a c e [ (nurturing the prime conditions for performance art[ists] in the UK) - and - VSSL Studio (a place of gathering, creation & development for queer, artistic practice).

They hold a BA Fine Art HONS (1st Class) from the University of Lincoln and MA Curating Art and Public Programmes (Distinction) through Whitechapel Gallery/London Southbank University - Sebastian’s continued research interests include; Artificial Intelligence, Occult Practices, Queer Ecologies, Decolonialism, Transhumanism, Contemporary Performance & Visual Art. Sebastian and their affiliated projects have recieved funding from Arts Council England, the British Council, Greater London Authority, Creative Folkestone, Kent County Council, Inspire Lewisham, Roger De Haan Charitable Trust and Live Art U.K. as well as other charities and local authorities.

Some of their most recent activities include: co-curating ‘Archipelago: Visions In Orbit’ at Whitechapel Gallery, performing at the launch of ‘Pretty Doomed’ at Ugly Duck (2023), exhibition of ‘Benjamin Sebastian + Alicia Radage’ at VSSL Studio (2023) curating ‘FACET’ at VSSL Studio (2023), guest curating the ‘Intersect series’ at the Live Art Development Agency (2023), speaking on the symposium; ‘Art, Memory & Place’ at Turner Contemporary (2022), as well as performance of their live installation ‘3 Reflections²’ as part of FUTURERITUAL at the Institute of Contemporary Art, London (2022).

Additional recent activity has included: curating ‘PSX: A Decade of Performance Art in the U.K.’ (2021) on behalf of ]performance s p a c e [, exhibition of their solo show ‘Working With Entities//Setting Intent’ (2021) at VSSL Studio, and curation of VSSL Studio’s inaugural programme; ‘Gathering in a Time of Plague’ (2021).

A complete history of Sebastian’s activity may be viewed through their archive and subscription to their mailing list is through this link.

projects

VSSL Studio
- was co-founded in 2020 by Benjamin Sebastian & Joseph Morgan Schofield and activated in 2021 with the gallery’s inaugural public programme; ‘Gathering in a Time of Plague’, funded by Arts Council England and co-curated by the galleries founders. In 2023 VSSL secured its’ second Arts Council England grant to deliver; ‘FACET’, curated by Benjamin Sebastian and produced by Ash McNaughton & Mine Kaplangi.

A place of gathering and creation, VSSL is a not-for-profit artistic studio and gallery housing multiple artists and projects - a site for artistic production and engagement, dedicated to the holding and nurturing of contemporary (queer) visual art and its’ satellites.

VSSL is a queer-led organisation centering queer artistic practice.

www.vssl-studio.org

]performance s p a c e [
- was co-founded in 2011 by Benjamin Sebastian & Bean with the mission: ‘to nurture the prime conditions for performance art(ists) in the U.K.’

Sebastian continues as a founding director alongside ]ps[ associate director; Ash McNaughton.

]ps[ is regularly funded by Arts Council England, most recently in 2021 for the organisations 10th anniversary programme; ‘PSX: A Decade of Performance Art in the U.K.’.

]performance s p a c e [ is a queer led organisation that aims to:

“... nurture the prime conditions for performance art(ists) in the U.K. We are committed to supporting challenging and difficult practices that embrace performance art as an ever-evolving medium.”

www.performancespace.org

Becoming Constellation
- was initiated in 2016 by Benjamin Sebastian as an ever evolving / incompletable, transmedial artwork and exhibition.

Encompassing sigil craft, tattooing, visual art exhibition & a continually growing collaborator set; Becoming Constellation seeks to map queer narrative production across people, geographies and time. Collaborators to date include:

Fabiola Paz,
Dani de’Emilia,
Ryan Burke,
JD Melling,
Keoui Keijaun Thomas,
Alicia Radage,
Andre Braga Verissimo,
Bean,
Joseph Morgan Schofield,
Matteo Cortés,
Jade Montserrat
and Esther Neff.

becoming constellation

“Ultimately, I’m engaged in a process of sense & worldmaking, attempting to better understand the systems, structures & ecologies I exist within, in order to critique & augment those fields as well as my position within them.”

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c.v.

archive

“Ultimately, I’m engaged in a process of sense & worldmaking, attempting to better understand the systems, structures & ecologies I exist within, in order to critique & augment those fields as well as my position within them.” about

projects

news

contact

c.v.

archive

“Ultimately, I’m engaged in a process of sense & worldmaking, attempting to better understand the systems, structures & ecologies I exist within, in order to critique & augment those fields as well as my position within them.”

about