Mat - Who, What, Why

Winning Blue

WB is a floor-based sculpture that consists of three elements. Held within a pentagonal vitrine, partially obscured behind tar-yellow tinted glass, sits a pentagonal sculptural form. This shape is rendered with Artex - a British domestic interior-decorating product popular in the 1980-90’s; the Artex extrudes from its face as a semi-circular basket weave reflecting and refracting against its reflective casing. The object as a whole, excluding its glazed facade, is sprayed with the colour ‘Winning Blue’, a deep faceted paint finish used within the high-performance automotive industry.

WB is a sculpture made with everyday trade materials and techniques; handmade from timber, MDF and plasterboard, plaster and render. By appropriating process, texture and finish synonymous with home DIY and car customization it is intentionally elevated into a new social arena.

WB sits at the intersection of the artists’ own personal memories of these textures and processes, in-turn interrogating its transition from one context to another. It becomes a monument to the impression they left behind; part trophy, part corporate sculpture and part cenotaph combining and overlaying the principles behind its design with an absolute attempt at embellishment.

McCracken Vend La Mine

MVLM saw me work closely with local amateur dramatic and non-professional theatre group members from the region of Copeland (West-Cumbria, UK) on developing a film artwork surrounding the local decline of industry. The films entire structure was based on the 1991 The Simpsons episode – ‘Burns Verkaufen der Kraftwerk’ (Mr. Burns sells the Power station). The final outcome was perceived as a flagship project for the fledging organisation under which it was commissioned.

Without revealing the scripts origin at any point, apart from on completion, I supplied it to a constituency of actors and writers initiated and forged via an open call to pre-existing and self-funded groups in the area. Under my supervision it undertook a series of re-writes and incarnations before finally being shot as a film on location within the grounds of Florence Mine, the last operating iron ore mine in Europe before ceasing operation in 2008 and re-opening as a contemporary arts organisation in 2011.

Through drawing a direct comparison between the adjacent town of Egremont, the closest satellite worker town to Sellafield Nuclear facility, and the fictional town of Springfield I looked to explore the impact a sole industry can have on the psychology of its immediate populous.

Learning to Fly

You are a witness to a folly of sorts. A man runs towards and launches himself off a ramp, landing like dead weight in a puff of dust on the ground. His arena, a furrowed piece of farmland is arid and angular. Nonetheless he picks himself up, brushes himself down and returns off camera for another run. His apparatus for this attempted flight is a simple ramp made from an old door and some breezeblocks. He repeats this action over and over until the pain becomes just too much to continue. The scene cuts. The sun is shining, the birds are singing and blooming wildflowers frame the scene. He repeats the same action. Once again, he fails.

This video is the first by collaborative duo Matt & Ross. Shot on location during their final year of their BA LTF earmarked not only the beginning of their collaboration, but an on-going commitment towards a homemade DIY ethic of performance and video that would continue right up to the end of their collaboration in 2010.

Initiating what would later become a reoccurring theme of failure within their work, the piece pre-dates the reality-stunt movement of Johnny Knoxville et al and seems to draw more from the teenage skaters of suburban Middle America, “borrowing” their parent’s Hi-8 cameras and documenting their misadventures’. Reverting to the enduring childhood ambition of flight as its starting point, the piece looks to the endurance of perseverance as some kind of consolation to the unattainable.