Coreset announces Grenadian artist Oliver Benoit as the inaugural participant in its International Residency Programme — a timely initiative bringing Caribbean artistic practice into dialogue with UK and global contexts.
Based in Newark, UK, and working internationally, Coreset launches the programme with one of the most significant Caribbean artists working today. Benoit’s practice operates through a richly layered visual language, bringing pigment, text and salvaged materials — crushed brick, hessian, newsprint — into dynamic tension. His abstract compositions function as sites of excavation and construction, engaging the entangled histories of slavery, colonialism, revolution and migration.
At the core of his work is a sustained decolonial enquiry: how histories are held, obscured and reactivated. His paintings operate simultaneously as archive and intervention — spaces where fragments of narrative coexist without closure. Everyday materials become carriers of cultural memory, challenging hierarchies of value and expanding definitions of monument and meaning within both Caribbean and global contexts.
The residency will commence in June 2026, bringing Benoit to the UK for a period of focused research, production and exchange. Alongside studio development, the programme will include a programme of artist networking events and curated introductions to gallerists, curators and institutional partners, creating meaningful opportunities for exchange, visibility and future collaboration, alongside conversations with peers and engagement with UK-based artistic networks.
The residency will culminate in a public exhibition of newly developed work in mid-July 2026, marking the first UK presentation of this evolving body of work.
During this period, Benoit will develop the next phase of his ongoing series, The Path of Fragments, deepening his engagement with archival research and site-responsive practice. Place becomes embedded within process, shaping both the physical structure and conceptual direction of the work.
Reflecting on the residency, Benoit said: “My practice investigates the quiet endurance of materials that hold suppressed or fragmented histories of Grenada, particularly in the aftermath of the Grenadian Revolution. Through layering, concealment and revelation, I allow partial narratives to coexist — without seeking historical closure. This residency offers a critical space for sustained research and experimentation, and for considering how memory operates not only within Grenada but across broader diasporic and post-revolutionary contexts.”
Rebecca Blackwood, Founder and Director of Coreset, said: “Launching our International Residency Programme with Oliver feels both urgent and necessary. His work holds a rare balance — intellectually rigorous, materially inventive and emotionally resonant. At Coreset, we are interested in practices that do more than reflect the world; they reframe it.”
Jenni Francis, cultural strategist and arts advisor in the UK, US and Caribbean, added: “Oliver Benoit is one of the most significant Caribbean artists working today. His practice holds complexity without resolution, grounded in material intelligence and historical depth. Rooted in the Caribbean, his work sits firmly within urgent global conversations on memory, power and decolonisation.”
The residency establishes a strong foundation for an ongoing international programme — connecting artists, ideas and audiences across geographies and positioning Coreset as a vital platform for international, process-led contemporary practice.
Benoit holds a PhD in Sociology from Brandeis University and an MFA from TransArt Institute/Plymouth University. His exhibition history includes the Venice Biennale (Grenada Pavilion), Expo 2020 Dubai (Grenada Pavilion), and exhibitions across the Caribbean, Europe and the United States.
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