Matthew Best

Untitled, 2014. Acrylic on canvas

I have two paintings on display in November at the new art gallery, Satellite Contemporary in Las Vegas. I'm excited to be a part of their inaugural show. It features paintings, works on paper and photography by Jared Jelsing, Eleanor Aldrich, Judith Baumann, Matthew Best, Joomi Chung, Sean Greene, Pang-Chieh Hsu, Sandy Litchfield, Morgan McKeehan, Larissa Mellor, Bridget Mullen, Bridget O’Brien, Nicole Stone and Derrick Velasquez.

The gallery describes their first show as:

"Unabashedly, Out-of-towners is an acknowledgement of our position outside the local arts scene. We are moving in, bringing with us our amazing friends, colleagues, and affiliates, and are hoping to introduce the Las Vegas community to a fresh, new pool of talent. For this inaugural exhibition, we wanted to collect a group of artists that represent our aspirations as a contemporary arts space. From Judith Baumann and her notorious Dead Wrestlers to Sara Pertras' elegant ladies, we have an enormous range of work in our little gallery. We invite you to see the it in person on Saturday November 15th, from 6-10pm at the Emergency Arts building on Fremont St. in downtown Las Vegas. For more information and directions, please see the contact page."

More information can be found here: http://www.satellitecontemporary.com/about-us/

On Saturday, May 31, 2014 AIDS Connecticut (ACT) will host its annual Art for AIDS fundraiser. Proceeds will benefit ACT and The Richard B. Fried Fund for AIDS Connecticut, a permanent endowment administered by the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving. Ticket prices range from $50 - $500 and include complimentary food, beverages, an art show and each ticket holder will take home an original piece of art designed by a local artist!

Detailed ticket information will be available soon on our website - Tickets will go on sale starting on April 25. Stay tuned for a preview of some of the fabulous art - It's an amazing event!

Sponsors include: Metayer Bonding Associates, Peel Liquor, GStream, The Uncommon Cupcake, Bear's BBQ, Barefoot Bubbly and La Petite France Bakery Cafe.

#burtreynolds, 2014. 24 by 36 inches. acrylic on panel.

My first solo show of 2014 will be up for two weeks (March 24- April 5) at Hartford's newest art gallery, EBK Gallery (http://ebkgallery.com/). The show will include some recent work that I haven't shown before as well as the 50 Cent Box. It will be the first time the 50 Cent Box has been exhibited in Connecticut outside of my studio.

There will be a closing reception on Saturday, April 5 from 6-8:30pm. Gallery hours are by request but the show can easily be seen from the street on off hours.

#lonianderson, 2014. 24 by 24 inches. acrylic on panel.

Untitled, 2013. 30 by 40 inches.

     In October I will be having a solo show of new paintings at ECA+ Gallery (http://www.easthamptoncityarts.com/UpcomingExhibitions) in Eashampton, MA. There will be an opening reception on October 12. This show represents the majority of my efforts for the last year or more. This show is about sensory experience, experiencing the world with all of the senses all at once. 

    I’ve always experienced the world as a tidal wave of sensory information; the five senses competing constantly for my attention. This series of paintings uses the vocabulary of painting to find new ways of depicting the overload, the collapse of the senses into visual form.  It makes use of paintings ability to condense moments of time into a fixed but dynamic image.

     I have become increasingly interested in examining how I process this information, what attracts my eye (pattern, color, contrast), what I love about music (repetition, layering, time). My brain constantly breaks things apart, small part of the whole interest me more than the whole. I find I generally never look at entirety of things; it is too hard to process. Smaller parts are more digestible. My aim was to create paintings that function in the same way; they can be taken as whole but also in smaller bits. Like music this becomes an experience that happens over time. Your eye can follow a particular line as it moves in and out of the picture plane, as color shifts, as layers move in and out of focus. The painting becomes a particular kind of space. This space exists in-between the micro and macro, drawing and writing, interior (mind) and exterior (the body and/or landscape).

     The conflicting stimuli collapse into one another. Layers are built up out of an alternating between an opacity that obscures and hides and a revealing translucency.  Some shapes are completely hidden; other shapes more deeply embedded in the picture plane are exposed by scrapped and sanding the painting down.

Moose Disco, 2013. Acrylic on panel. 24 by 24 inches.

My untitled 2012 ink on paper drawing will be included in Paper  New England's 5th Anniversary Exhibition at Artspace Gallery, Hartford,CT. The show will be on view from June 15 to July 14 with an opening reception on Saturday, June 15 from 6:30-9:00pm.

Untitled, 2012. ink on paper, 22 by 30 inches.