Marcus Matt has mentioned that his works could be described as postcards sent to the viewer from an unknown place. The sources of Matt’s condense expression stem from a wide range of thoughts and experiences, transferred to the canvas through both wide and wet, and bare and almost scratched, brushstrokes. Matt’s technique is airy and beautiful, his surfaces filled with brushstrokes that are effortlessly alive, his visual vocabulary concentrated and pithy, his muted palette gentle.
Marcus Matt’s works are inspired by philosophical, literary and pictorial starting points, which are condensed into a beautifully simple imagery. In creating the piece Radiowaves, Matt was intrigued by the way rain is represented by lines in traditional Japanese woodcuts, as well as the idea he encountered in a poem by Raymond Carver that radio waves might find it easier to travel after rain. ”I’m looking for that rare event when the painting starts to speak to me, when I’m absorbed in the paint itself and in the canvas instead of my own desires.”
Group Show
Galerie Anhava
Helsinki, 2023