Matthew Kirk
Matthew Kirk’s (b. 1978, Ganado, AZ) art exudes a rhythmic intensity based in a matrix of mark-making that he has developed, inspired by abstractions, comics, and Diné (Navajo) imagery, freely mixing materials including oil stick, chalk, gouache, spray paint, graphite, acrylic paint, colored tape, staples, and brass BBs, in a compositional strategy that merges a representation of the landscape of the Southwest and the freeform abstraction of music. An enrolled member of the Navajo Nation, Kirk’s paintings and sculpture explore the space between the hegemonic American visual image of the Native and his lived experience, exploiting the hackneyed to both embrace and question imposed cultural tropes.
Kirk is currently included in The Brooklyn Artists Exhibition, Brooklyn Museum (Brooklyn, NY) on view October 4, 2024–January 26, 2025. He has exhibited at Pr1mary Space Gallery (Hamtramck, MI), Louis B. James (New York, NY), Makasiini Contemporary (Turku, Finland), and Halsey McKay Gallery (East Hampton, NY), among others.
Select Works
Select Exhibitions
Select Press
2022
2016
Plagens, Peter. “Mysterious Creatures, 3D Printing and Mixed Media.” The Wall Street Journal, January 2016
2015
Indrisek, Scott. “Subtlety and Sheetrock,” Modern Painters, August 2015.
McGurran, Brianna. “No MFA, No Problem: A Look Inside the Outsider Art Fair,” The New York Observer, January 30, 2015.
Indrisek, Scott. “Art for Art’s Sake: Insider Picks at the Outsider Fair,” BlouinArtinfo.com, January 29, 2015.