INTERVIEW
ADAM & VICTORIA BENNS
MIXED MEDIA ARTIST VICTORIA BENNS IS THE CREATIVE BRAIN BEHIND SCRIBBLE ORIGINALS – A BEAUTIFUL, NEW WAY OF REPRESENTING CHILDREN’S DRAWINGS AS UNIQUE KEEPSAKES. HUSBAND ADAM IS A SUCCESSFUL LOCAL ARCHITECT.
F
rom her studio in the home she shares with her Dartmouth Architect
husband Adam and their three young children, Victoria creates Scribble Originals by making a careful line drawing from a child’s original picture. She adds a quirky quote from the child and then paints and embellishes the work with personalised objects – such as fabric from the child’s baby clothes and buttons from granny’s sewing box. The work is then embossed with the Scribble Original logo and individually signed by Violet Browne, a pseudonym of Victoria. Each picture is then locally framed. Victoria said: “I add a little bit of
sparkle to the child’s magic! I embellish their work with all sorts of carefully selected bits and bobs, from buttons and ribbon to pages, from old books and little parts from broken mechanical objects. I use items personal to the child and their family along with other finds of my own which i have acquired through scouring local shops, markets and charity shops. I get very excited about buttons and beads and love collecting and exploring vintage shops and stalls for great finds!” The former art teacher gained her
inspiration from hours of watching and listening to her three young children - charlie, aged eight, hazel, aged seven, and five-year-old arthur. She said: “All three are very creative.
Charlie’s drawings are quite technical, hazel is very bold and colourful with her pictures and Arthur is an ‘emerging artist’. The playroom is full of paper, scissors and creative paraphernalia. Kids are so free when they’re being creative and say the funniest things, which I’ve captured in my collages, such as ‘I could
make a really big pyramid out of cheese’ and ‘monkeys have chins!’. “With three children so young and close in age I’ve needed to stay at home and it’s been inspirational being creative with them. I learnt a lot from my teaching days on the psychology of how children learn and draw. I love watching the amazing things they create and it feels such a waste to get rid of their artwork – I have lots of it filed away! it seemed a shame not to do something with all this creativity and that’s where the idea for Scribble Originals began”
“The family live an
idyllic, outdoor life with lots of walking, cycling and camping.”
Victoria recently exhibited Scribble
Original at the Dartmouth Art weekend and has already started selling commissions through her website and word of mouth. “Friends in marketing and sales who
have seen Scribble Original said, ‘you just have to do something with this idea’.” As well as Scribble Original, Victoria still paints, under the name Victoria Benns, for commissions and exhibitions. Victoria has been avidly drawing and painting since she was a child, and said her mum never went anywhere without paper and pens to feed her daughter’s habit. After A levels, Victoria went to Winchester School of Art for her
foundation year and then Leeds University to study a BA in Furniture Design. After a brief stint in design, she followed her passion for art through teaching the subject at secondary schools in Oxford and Bath. Victoria met Adam in 1996 in the
Green Dragon pub in the village of Stoke Fleming where Adam grew up. Following in his father Bob Benns’ footsteps, Adam studied for a BSc in Architecture at Bath University. He met Victoria at the end of his degree and went on to do his diploma at Oxford Brookes. Adam and Victoria lived in Oxford for two years, then Bath for four, before moving back to Devon to start their family nine years ago. Adam said: “The opportunity arose to come back to Devon and become part of my father’s business, with a view to take it over one day. The timing was perfect as Victoria and I were planning to start a family. “I grew up here myself, spending
wonderful days in the countryside and on the beaches. It’s such a great place to be and an amazing place to bring up the children. “Victoria also grew up in the
countryside, near Winchester, and so loves the life style here too. Her parents moved down to Devon shortly after we did, so the children have all their grandparents near by, which is perfect.” Adam and Victoria originally lived
in Moreleigh while converting their barn on the outskirts of Dittisham. They moved into the beautifully hi-spec conversion, which Adam drew the architectural plans for, seven years ago. The family live an idyllic, outdoor
life with lots of walking, cycling and camping. Their children play lots of sport,
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