Ana Benaroya depicts female bodies that push against gender and societal norms. Their intensely colored figures are bursting with energy, their exaggerated muscles and breasts refusing to be contained as they dissolve the binary between the male and the female form. They capture the intensity of lesbian desire, projecting confidence in the way they hold their bodies and engage the viewer.

Benaroya has long been fascinated by the superhero-esque male body that dominated the comics of her youth and she continues to draw on the legacy of comics and caricature in her work, citing artists like Peter Saul, Carroll Dunham, and Tom of Finland as inspiration. She is keenly aware of the subversive power of humor and toes the line between funny and serious in her depictions of violence, sexuality, and desire. 

Jersey City-based artist Ana Benaroya (born 1986) is known for her dazzling paintings of muscle-bound women made in eye-popping Fauvist tones. The women in the pictures bristle with confidence: they ride horses, stride through ocean waves, and speed down highways in convertibles, cigarettes dangling out of their mouths. And all this while totally nude, with writhing musculature on full display.

Benaroya received her BFA from Maryland Institute College of Art and her MFA in Painting from Yale University. She has been the subject of solo exhibitions at Venus Over Manhattan, New York; Carl Kostyal Gallery, London; Ross + Kramer, New York; and Richard Heller Gallery, Los Angeles, among others. Benaroya’s work can be found in the collections of institutions such as the Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami; Pérez Art Museum, Miami; The High Art Museum, Atlanta; and the Zuzeum Art Center, Riga.