Available Works

About

Ben Orkin (b. 1998; Cape Town, South Africa) is a ceramic sculptor based in Cape Town, South Africa. His vessels reflect an organic language formed between his relationships with clay and the body, including queer intimacy that oscillate between moments of nourishment and dependency, validation and resistance, love and separation. Their textured finish is evidence of the hand-builder’s careful touch, imbuing the sculptures with a sense of the tactile and, at times, the erotic.

Orkin graduated in 2020 with a BFA from Michaelis School of Fine Art in Cape Town, South Africa. Since 2019, he has held three solo exhibitions with WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town, namely You told me… (2019), Extra Safe (2021) and Backrooms, Bookstores, Balconies, Meatracks and Tearooms (2023). Recent group exhibitions include Seven Contours, One Collection with MACAAL in 2025, Re/presentation of the Figure (2024; Group Auction) with Strauss&co, We, the People: 30 years of Democracy in South Africa (2024-2025) at Norval Foundation, and Significant Other (2024) at WITW x Krone in Tulbagh, Cape Town, South Africa. He was also awarded the Simon Gerson prize in 2021 with select work acquired by the A4 Foundation.

In 2022, Orkin participated in the OÖ AIR artist-in-residence program at OÖ Landes-Kultur GmbH Museumstraße. His artwork is also part of the public collection OÖ Landes-Kultur GmbH, Austria. Orkin has participated in various art fairs locally and internationally, including Art Cologne (2024/2023), Investec Cape Town Art Fair (2023), FNB Art Joburg (2023), NOMAD Capri 2023, Investec Cape Town Art Fair (2023), Art Joburg (2022), 1-54 London (2022), and miart Milan (2022).

 

Selected Press:

Ben Orkin’s sensory ceramics: safe sex, pleasure, and the stigmas of HIV by Sean O’Toole, Wallpaper*, 2022

Ben Orkin, A Language of Forms, Art Formes

Selected Solo Exhibitions

2023	Backrooms, Bookstores, Balconies, Meatracks and Tearooms - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
2021	Extra Safe - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
2019	You told me... - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town

Selected Group Exhibitions

2025	Seven Contours, One Collection, MACAAL, Marrakesh, Morocco
	We, the People: 30 Years of Democracy in South Africa, Norval Foundation, curated by Liese van der Watt and supported by Carmen Joubert, Cape Town, South Africa
2024	La grotte de l’amitié, La Maréchalerie centre d’art contemporain, ÉNSA Versailles, Versailles, France
	Compressing Materiality, Ebony Curated, Bordeaux House, Franschhoek
	Significant Other - Twee Jonge Gezellen Wine Estate, Krone x WHATIFTHEWORLD, Tulbagh, South Africa
2023	Fullhouse, blank projects, Cape Town
	Oh So Quiet - WHATIFTHEWORLD, Cape Town
2022	Seeds of the Fig - Twee Jonge Gezellen Wine Estate, Krone x WHATIFTHEWORLD, Tulbagh, South Africa
2021	RESTUDIO, Cunningham Contemporary, Johannesburg
2020	Shaping Things, SMAC Gallery, Stellenbosch
	Art Rotterdam, Nuweland, The Netherlands

Art Fairs

Miart 2025

Art Cologne 2024

Cape Town Art Fair 2024

Art Cologne 2023

FNB Art Joburg 2023

NOMAD Capri 2023

Cape Town Art Fair 2023

Miart 2022

1-54 London 2022

Joburg Art Fair 2022

Awards

Permanent Collections