Artist Report

       Matthew Ritchie graduated from Camberwell College of Arts in London, England in 1986 where he received his BFA.  Since the early 1990's he's established himself prominently in the contemporary art scene.  His creation process involves him making drawings and scanning them into the computer where he then alters, deconstructs or transfers into 3D images, where he can then print them out, project them on large walls, create interactivity or send them as plans to a metal shop to make them into sculptures.  He layers his drawings on transparent paper as a part of his planning process so as to draw out the narrative from his series of motifs and ideas. 
       His main ongoing motif is information and how we use information to explore religion philosophy and science.  By doing this he has created his own narrative for an alternate universe where these ideas are manipulated through a different information "tunnel" in which science and religion may have coincided differently.  His most recent pieces, 'Ghost Operator' and 'Universal Adversary', which were featured in New York in London, use these different archetypes of information to document an alternate universe divergent from how our own history of time unfolded.  He explained in a PBS:Art21 interview that he is very much interested in representing scientific innovation but without being completely accurate, he says that his philosophy is rather "a way of having a conversation that’s based on an idea of looking at things than I am in the rhetoric around science."  Since 1990, he has over 25 solo shows and participated in over 100 group exhibitions in galleries such as The Guggenheim, The MoMA, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Basilico Fine Arts, and the Dallas Museum of Art.  He currently works and lives out of New York City.