Aaron Benjamin Cohen (b. 1995, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) is a mixed media artist whose practice moves between painting, sculpture, and salvage. Working across traditional canvas and constructed surfaces, Benjamin Cohen incorporates discarded plexiglass, paper, plastic, collected advertisements, and other found materials alongside conventional painting materials. Through cutting, sanding, fusing, layering, and partial erasure, fragments of these materials’ previous lives remain visible within the work.
His paintings often occupy threshold states, with figures emerging through accumulated layers of paint, exposed drawing, printed imagery, and salvaged ephemera. Advertising enters the work as both material and image, carrying traces of the commercial systems embedded in daily life.
Born and raised in Philadelphia, Benjamin Cohen attended the University of the Arts before continuing his practice independently. He later spent a year living and working in Mexico City, where experiments with discarded materials began to shape his approach to surface and image. Benjamin Cohen is currently based in New York City.