Through the Senses

This collection of works began with food as a starting point – its colour, texture, and capacity to carry memory and sensation. The exhibition that has emerged moves well beyond that origin. Works here drew inspiration from seaweed, bark, flowers, landscapes, and treasured objects. What connects them is not subject matter but a shared willingness to look with curiosity and respond to what the senses offer.

Through the Senses

Student exhibition: Edible Abstraction with Nicola Bennett

"Welcome to ‘Through the Senses’, an exhibition of work created by students of my online course, Edible Abstraction. When I first developed this course, food was simply the starting point. Food offers us colour, texture, memory, emotion and connection. It engages all of the senses and provides such a rich source of inspiration for abstract painting. Yet as this exhibition demonstrates, once we learn to look with curiosity, inspiration begins to appear everywhere. Some of the works in this exhibition began with food, while others emerged from seaweed, bark, flowers, gardens, landscapes and treasured objects.

What connects them is not the subject matter itself, but the willingness of each artist to look through their senses, respond intuitively and trust the process of making. This exhibition celebrates the paintings and drawings that have emerged throughout the course, but it also celebrates something much deeper: the courage to step into the unknown. Again and again, I watched students step beyond familiar ways of working. They experimented with new materials, explored new approaches, and developed new ways of seeing.

 

They allowed themselves space to play, make mistakes, follow unexpected directions and discover more about their own creative voice.

As artists, we often want certainty. We want to know where a painting is heading and whether it will succeed. Yet some of the most rewarding creative moments happen when we loosen our grip on the outcome and become responsive to what is unfolding in front of us. Many of the works in this exhibition hold evidence of that process: layers built over time, marks that surprised their maker, compositions that evolved through observation, curiosity and play.

Throughout the course, we returned often to the idea that love sits at the heart of making. Love of marks. Love of colour. Love of materials. Love for the natural world. Love for paying attention. And perhaps most importantly, love for the process itself.

Not every experiment led where it was expected to go, but each one offered an opportunity to learn, grow and connect more deeply with the act of creating. I have been continually inspired by the openness, dedication and courage of the artists represented here.

It has been a privilege to share this experience with them and to witness the extraordinary variety of responses that emerged from a shared starting point.

I invite you to spend time with these works, to notice their marks, layers, colours and stories and to experience them as they were created:

Through the senses.

– Nicola


Would you like a printed copy of this Exhibition book?

Click the button below to purchase the online student exhibition as a printed book. Please note that Peecho (provider of the printed book) is a third party book printing company and we have no control over the postage costs to your destination.

 

2 min read

By Take Two
Sep 10 2026

Edible Abstraction with Nicola Bennett Student exhibitions

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