Matthew Ritchie

Matthew Ritchie's installations of painting, wall drawings, light boxes, sculpture, and projections are investigations of the idea of information; explored through science, architecture, history and the dynamics of culture, defined equally by their range and their lyrical visual language.

                                    "The Universal Cell" Whitney Museum of American Art, New York 2005

                                     "The Universal Cell" Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, 2005

Matthew Ritchie's work takes a basic line and takes it farther in meaning, in space, and in motion. He is a lover of layers, both literal and conceptual. His art goes back and forth between computer generation and hand execution: Imagery is drawn, scanned, projected, traced, scanned again, and printed and animated in myriad ways. The large framed canvases build up layers of different mark making: stains, drips, loops, and squiggles that constantly play off the macro and microcosmic.

"Universal cell" represents how Ritchie uses animated imagery by  incorporating the computer into his work.  The denotation of "Universal cell" is a cell that was created as a module (a small piece of many drawings) using the computer.  The connotation of a cell being portrayed as a representation of how small we are in the universe.  This piece was created using several different drawings and the sculpture is only a small fraction of the image as a whole.  Ritchie wanted to sustain the drawing.  The structure built is a cell conveying how society imprisons us each individually.  We are locked in to a point of view; we build prisons.  If we do one bad thing, we go to jail.  Every crime has the same punishment.  The context of information we gain defines everything.  "Universal cell" characterizes everyone in their own prison and captures our biology, life, and social structure; both of which are challenges and opportunities.

Matthew Ritchie, Proposition Player, 2003, powder-coated aluminum, Minicel foam, rubber, adhesive, electronic components, one pair cast resin dice, custom-designed deck of cards, 42 by 42 by 98 inches

"Proposition Player" is an example of interactive art which is creating art using drawn imagery and the computer.  The denotation of this is five playing cards: Four aces and one joker.  The connotation of  the story being told in this fantasy world can be understood on a number of levels. For one, it recounts a scientific narrative of origins: the history of the universe from the Big Bang to the present. Ritchie also describes this history as a metaphor for the construction of art. He has, further, characterized his work as pictures of thinking.  The paintings most directly seem to depict consciousness itself. In the landscape of "Proposition Player,"contradictory ideas about the world appear and overlap on the same plane just as they often do in our minds. Scientific symbols are graphed alongside phrases from gambling and pictures from the tarot; human figures stand immersed in a murky atmosphere that could denote weather systems, technology or religious beliefs. The result depicts contemporary society less so than our condition of living in it. It represents the mental nude.

Ritchie's installations fuse unique narrative forms with our constantly changing factual understanding of our universe.

http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/ritchie/
http://www.artnet.com/artist/14305/matthew-ritchie.html
http://current.com/groups/culture/89742966_the-art-of-matt-ritchie.htm