Matthew Ritchie
British (London, England, 1964)Matthew Ritchie's work dramatizes the deep-seated human impulse to explain natural forces and to organize knowledge into systems. In his ongoing, ambitious project of representing the entire universe, Ritchie unites ancient mythic and religious traditions with contemporary science and philosophy. Highly theoretical concepts ranging from the astronomical to the subatomic are personified as characters (somewhere in between pagan deities and superheroes), and linked in ever-expanding narratives. The artworks that map this cosmology include drawings, sculptural installations, and online projects. Their formal extravagance and clarity are strongly influenced by digital imaging technology.
Ritchie attended Boston University and London's Camberwell College of Arts; he has lived and worked in New York since 1988.
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