William Behnken, born in 1943, has been a life-long resident of New York City. He began his formal studies at the High School of Music & Art and has an MA and BA from The City College of New York, where he has been teaching for over four decades. He has also taught printmaking and drawing at the Provincetown Art Association Museum Summer School from 1984 to 2000, and at the National Academy of Design School from 2000 to 2007, and has been an Instructor in Printmaking at the Art Students League since 1997. Mr. Behnken is an Elected Member of the National Academy of Design and of the Society of American Graphic Artists, serving as its president from 1997 to 2002. His prints have won numerous awards among which are the Gold Medal of Honor from Audubon Artists, the Ralph Fabri Award in Graphics from the National Academy, and Lifetime Achievement Awards from the Society of American Artists and the Art Alumni Association of The City College of New York. His work has been shown in many solo and group exhibitions both nationally and internationally and is in numerous permanent collections a selection of which are the Metropolitan Museum of Art, The British Museum, the Fitzwilliam Museum, the New York Public Library Print Room, the New Orleans Museum and the Mississippi Museum

In my work I try to use the harmonious order of design and the expressive characteristics of tonal values to give a permanent and memorable order to the fleeting moments of impressive, poetic, and emotional experiences.