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Check Out Bennett Slater’s Chilling Halloween Piece “Infernal”

Zac Thompson · October 30, 2014

Just in time for Halloween, artist Bennett Slater has given us a glimpse of his newest piece, and it’s fucking chilling. He created the piece for a Halloween-themed show at Auguste Clown Gallery in Australia opening Halloween night. His style is uncompromising and depicts the terror that I believe is captured by the weird old oil painting portraits of old. This is seriously chilling stuff.

Here’s Bennett’s inspiration in his own words:

For this piece, I delved into Dante’s “Inferno”, from the 14th Century poem “Divine Comedy”. Centered around a man traversing the 9 circles of Hell, there’s one section that always stuck with me, which features a corrupted man (Ugolino) forced to eat his own sons. I combined Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux’s 19th century sculpture “Ugolino and His Sons” with a contemporary costume depiction of satan. It’s interesting- the difference a century makes. The excerpt from “Inferno” which I based the piece reads:

“His mouth raised up above his savage meal,

That sinner wiped his lips upon the hair

Of the head that he had chewed on from behind.

Then he began, “You want me to make new

A desperate grief which even to call back

Crushes my heart before I start to speak.

“But should my words become a fruitful seed

Of infamy for this traitor whom I gnaw,

You’ll see me speak and weep at the same time.”

Infernal_WEB4 — Title: “Infernal” Medium: oil on wood Size: 12″x12″ Artist: Bennett Slater

And for those of you looking to attend the art show, you can find details on that right here:

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