Benjamin had formed an excellent creative partnership with Master Screenprinter, Kevin Harris when he was commuting back and forth between Canada and London when they were working together to produce the TransAtlantic suite of images. His prints were selling well and winning prizes at international exhibitions; he enjoyed the whole business of printmaking and was keen to do more. He also was good at working cooperatively with skilled technicians, because he was very skilled himself, and partly because he knew what he wanted to achieve and realised that having the best people to work with would help him to achieve the the challenging goals he set for himself. He wanted to do more screen printing because it was a good way of working with the intense colours he loved.

When he finally finished with Canada and was again living in London, he resumed personal contact with Brian Eno who was fully involved in his music career, enjoying the fun of being a ‘Pop Star’, even tho he was not a musician in the conventional way. He was brimming with enthusiasm about the endless possibilities in the relatively new field of electronic music. During their lively wide-ranging, conversations, Benjamin evolved the concept of making prints that had a vibrating, visual impact within each image, as well as with other images in a set, that related to the aural impact of electronic music. Eno invited him and Nancy to a Roxy rehearsal at the Hammersmith, Odeon; they watched a few numbers from the back row of the huge cinema enjoying the sounds’ then during a pause in the music, Bryan Ferry noticed them sitting there in the dark, and threw a tempermental wobbler, so they had to leave. This was disappointing, but it did nothing to dampen Benjamin’s enthusiasm about making a suite of prints to be named - the Roxy Bias Suite.

Benjamin was delighted that Kevin Harris shared his enthusiasm for the project and agreed to work with him again at Calvert Studios. The procedure was collaborative; Harris set everything up and Benjamin cut the stencils by drawing directly on the film with a sharp scalpel, not by tracing over a drawing. After the stencils were mounted, they dove into the proofing using a ide range of vibrant intense colour, intending to produce six images by using an experimental proofing process, not by following any preconceived designs. They printed the various stencils in many different colour combinations, searching for the maximum colour impact. “Let’s try this one … darker?… more blue? … a bit more? …That’s it, Let’s print!”…

Benjamin and Harris

Then the proofs were pinned on the studio wall for them, and anyone else who was around to compare and offer opinions over a cup of tea, or a bottle of wine. Eventually six images in three pairs that had the most dynamic impact together, as well as with the other images, were selected. The titles for the Roxy Bias Suite were terms for electronic music functions that Benjamin picked up in conversations with Eno - Butterfly Echo, Erase Function, Ringing Filter, Inverse Echo, Multi-Mode Jitter, and ‘O’Factor. Harris then undertook the exacting task of printing the six selected proofs in editions of 95, with A/Ps, on BFK Rives,105 x 76 cm., handmade paper, signed, and numbered by Benjamin; the unselected, but equally beautiful images were also signed as- ‘Unique Proof’s.

The Suite was an immediate success, winning several prizes at International exhibitions, including the Cracow Biennale, as well as in the corporate market on both side of the Atlantic. Rank Xerox had several sets for their headquarters and private clients sually purchased them them in pairs. The prints were published by Clarendon Graphics, distributed by Gorner and Millard in the UK, and Marlborough Goddard in Canada. Erase Function won a prize in a juried exhibition of more than 1200 prints, sponsored by the Ontario Arts Council. The mainly blue image almost sold out in the show that was marketed as - “Art for people with more taste than money”.