Matthew Ritchie

For Matthew Ritchie, everything has a story to tell. As an artist, it is Ritchie's job to tell it. 

His artwork consists of materials such as paint and metals.

The main and pretty much only theme that drives Ritchie's pieces is the universe. Everything about the universe interests Ritchie, so all the different aspects of it influences his work. This interest has resulted in pieces such as Ritchie's game that's based off the four forces of of the universe as well his cosmic kind of cell based off of the idea that everyone's place in the universe is like a prison. The universe theme can also be seen in Ritchie's drawing that never ends. What he does with this pieces is continually add to an original drawing that started it all so that it progressively gets larger and larger as time goes on. In a way, this piece is the universe of all his drawings. 

Ritchie's works are mainly constructed of lines. They appear to be continuous and very decorative with lots of loops and overlapping. Sometimes these lines are two-dimensional when he presents them as paintings and three-dimensional when he presents them as sculptures. These same kind of lines appear throughout most of Ritchie's works, so repetition plays a part in his art as a whole as well. 

With some artists, they make everything plain and clear with their art so there is no confusion. However, this is not a goal of Ritchie's. Instead, he wants his works to be more contemplative and for his audience to leave with more questions than what they came in with.

Information provided by:

"Matthew Ritchie." Art21. PBS, n.d. Web. 15 Mar. 2014.