Paul Benney: Night Paintings

A series of allegorical paintings by artist Paul Benney, inspired by the poet Federico Garciá Lorca and themes of religious faith, isolation and nature. Benney has been artist-in-residence at Somerset House for the past two years and the show includes works made during his residency. The paintings are displayed beneath the Edmund J Safra Fountain Court, in a series of lightwells and corridors known as the 'Dead House', which contains the gravestones of seventeenth-century nobility. The atmospheric setting lends itself to the subjects of the paintings, which include shamanistic presences and mysterious hinterlands.