Peter Matthews

ARTIST'S STATEMENT

My work is discovered and made when ‘out there’ in the ocean. I am not really sure what I am doing when I am submerged and drifting around in the ocean with the paper nailed to a piece of plywood.
My work is motivated with being in a place that is isolated and away from technology, a place and space that is closer to the presence and forces of the universe, such as the moon, stars, gravity and so on, but the element of time is equally important in my practice – how time moves and the speed of time for instance.

I am not really sure where I am going or where the work is going when I pass the intertidal zone and move towards the horizon. There is a point of departure and then a point of entry into a new sense of space when I work on the ocean, and these visceral, spiritual, physical and mystical clouds are things that I am fascinated to pass through. The prepositions of place ‘in’ and ‘on’ are closely connected to my motivations to push and explore how a drawing can be made.

I am interested in the relationship between the drawing as an object and the ocean as a subject.

There is a point in the long hours spent drifting in the ocean mapping reality as it appears to my enhanced and amplified perceptual field of view when the drawing becomes a part of the ocean, where object and subject fuse together and become indivisible.

There are things that I see and record out there in the oceans whilst submerged in the celestial soup of our planet that are beyond our perceptual and haptic relationships with reality as we stand on dry land. Instinctively speaking, perhaps I am prospecting for a new world, spiritually speaking, I feel more aligned and centred out there in the ocean, I do not need a password or username to get in the ocean, it is just the drawing and the ocean’s dynamic world in a profound interrelationship. I am fascinated by the slippage point of where the body becomes removed from the practice of creating a drawing, where the body’s biorhythm and state of mind become that of the ocean’s pulse and enigma. At the same time of finding something new and unexplored out there in the ocean, something is lost or in a state of disappearance or collapse.


CV

Born in 1978 in Derby, England

Education

MFA, Nottingham Trent University, England, 2002 - 2003
BFA with Honours, Nottingham Trent University, England, 1998 - 2001

Solo Exhibitions
2013 Beers.Lambert Contemporary Art, London, England, Surroundings
2011 James Cohan Gallery, New York, USA, Continuum
Mendes Wood Gallery, Sao Paulo, Brazil, Sea Marks

Selected Group Exhibitions

2013 North Carolina Museum of Art, North Carolina, USA, 0:60 The Experience of Time through Contemporary Art (cat)
Pratt Manhattan Gallery, New York, USA, 0:60 The Experience of Time through Contemporary Art
Künstlerhaus Dortmund, Germany, Sea Journeys
Forum Factory, Berlin, Germany, Glasklar Milchig
Royal West of England Academy, Bristol, England, Drawn 2013
2012 James Cohan Gallery, New York, USA, Landscape
The Library Space, Battersea, Beers Lambert Contemporary Arts, London, England, A History Revisited Patrick Heide Contemporary Art, London, Breeder
Metropolitan Pavilion, New York, USA, Pulse 2012 represented by Patrick Heide Contemporary Art, London James Cohan Gallery, New York, USA, VIP Works on Paper (online)
Karst, Plymouth, England, Spectral
2011 James Cohan Gallery, New York, USA, Cosmology
Beers Lambert Contemporary Art, London, England, Systems Beyond Certainty
Patrick Heide Contemporary Art, London, England, Landscape and Memory
Centro de Artes y Naturaleza Film Festival, Zaragoza, Spain, Proyectaragon
George Place, Stone House, Plymouth, England, (coinciding with the British Art Show 7) Vessel
Kentler Gallery, New York, USA, Marked Differences
New Curtois Gallery, The Collection, Lincoln, England, Opem
2010 Drawing Center, New York, USA, Selections Spring 2010: Sea Marks
Drawing Center, New York, USA, Benefit Auction Drawing Gifts 2010
Mall Galleries, London, England, ING Discerning Eye Drawing Exhibition
Raday Kepshaz Galeria, Budapest, Hungary, With/Drawn
Annex 21, Worcester, England, Worcester Contemporary Open
Bonington Gallery, Nottingham, England, Sculptures from the Media Stream
2009 Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien Gallery, Berlin, Germany, Drawings No.10
Derby Museum and Art Gallery, Derby, England, Derby City Open
2008 Centre for Recent Drawing, London, England, Pacific Ocean Drawings
2006 New Media Gallery, Virginia, USA, Contemporary Perspectives and New Media
Darlington College of Arts, Devon, England, DRHA
2004 Barrett Art Center, New York, USA, Photowork 2004
Derby Museum and Art Gallery, Derby, England, One Step Beyond
2003 T.W. Art Gallery, Vermont, USA, Contemporary Drawing
Santa Cruz Mountains Art Center, California, USA, Time and Transcendence

Awards

2011 Landscape Instants Film Prize, CDAN Centro de Artes Naturales, Huesca, Spain
Drawing Prize, OPEM, New Curtois Gallery, Lincoln, England
2010 Short listed for the ING Discerning Eye Drawing Bursary 2010
2009 Honorarium, Drawing Center, New York
British Council Grant to Visual Artist
2008 AA2A Grant to Practicing Artist
Windsor and Newton Writing Award
2005 Arts Council of England Professional Development Grant
2004 Princess Trust Grant