Benjamín Palencia came from a family who worked the land, but he moved to Madrid in 1909 and took up drawing. He entered the First Autumn Salon with a symbolic composition of Larra, and befriended Juan Ramón Jiménez, Francisco Gutiérrez Cossío, Salvador Dalí, Francisco Bores, José María de Ucelay and other students at the San Fernando School of Fine Arts, where Palencia did not study. In 1923, he published Niños [Children], an album of drawings with texts by Juan Ramón Jiménez, with the Índice publishing house. Palencia travelled to Paris, where he became friends with Pablo Picasso and Juan Gris and worked at the Grand Chaumière Academy. He took part in the I Exhibition of Iberian Artists and founded the Vallecas School with Alberto Sánchez, which would be highly influential on the pre-war artistic scene. In 1928 he exhibited at the Modern Art Museum and travelled to Italy, the United Kingdom, Germany and the United States. In 1930, he exhibited again at the Madrid Museum of Modern Art, he wrote Giotto, raíz viva de la pintura and Los Nuevos artistas españoles and exhibited at the Loeb Gallery in Paris. After the Spanish Civil War, the Vallecas School movement re-emerged at Cerro Artesa, where it would last for two years and garner followers including Francisco San José, Álvaro Delegado and Luis García-Ochoa. Palencia then moved to Villafranca de la Sierra in Ávila. He was awarded the Third Place Medal at the 1941 National Exhibition of Fine Arts and the First Place Medal for View of Toledo in 1943. His canvases appeared in the anthologies of the Academy of Art Critics, which sponsored the Salon of the Eleven, from 1944 to 1946.
Benjamín Palencia came from a family who worked the land, but he moved to Madrid in 1909 and took up drawing. He entered the First Autumn Salon with a symbolic composition of Larra, and befriended Juan Ramón Jiménez, Francisco Gutiérrez Cossío, Salvador Dalí, Francisco Bores, José María de Ucelay and other students at the San Fernando School of Fine Arts, where Palencia did not study. In 1923, he published Niños [Children], an album of drawings with texts by Juan Ramón Jiménez, with the Índice publishing house. Palencia travelled to Paris, where he became friends with Pablo Picasso and Juan Gris and worked at the Grand Chaumière Academy. He took part in the I Exhibition of Iberian Artists and founded the Vallecas School with Alberto Sánchez, which would be highly influential on the pre-war artistic scene. In 1928 he exhibited at the Modern Art Museum and travelled to Italy, the United Kingdom, Germany and the United States. In 1930, he exhibited again at the Madrid Museum of Modern Art, he wrote Giotto, raíz viva de la pintura and Los Nuevos artistas españoles and exhibited at the Loeb Gallery in Paris. After the Spanish Civil War, the Vallecas School movement re-emerged at Cerro Artesa, where it would last for two years and garner followers including Francisco San José, Álvaro Delegado and Luis García-Ochoa. Palencia then moved to Villafranca de la Sierra in Ávila. He was awarded the Third Place Medal at the 1941 National Exhibition of Fine Arts and the First Place Medal for View of Toledo in 1943. His canvases appeared in the anthologies of the Academy of Art Critics, which sponsored the Salon of the Eleven, from 1944 to 1946.