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Matthew Picton
A Seeker’s Paradise
February 1 to March 16, 2024
NANCY TOOMEY FINE ART
1275 Minnesota Street, San Francisco
Matthew Picton, Rio de Janeiro, “The City of God,” 2017, archival prints and photographs, pencils, film posters, pins, 53 x 53 x 4 inches
Nancy Toomey Fine Art is pleased to announce an exhibition of works by Matthew Picton titled A Seeker’s Paradise on view from February 1 to March 16, 2024. The gallery is located inside San Francisco’s Minnesota Street Project, 1275 Minnesota Street. Gallery hours are Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays, 12pm to 4pm, and by appointment–please contact nancy@nancytoomeyfineart.com or 415-307-9038.
The public is invited to meet artist Matthew Picton, in town from Ashland, Oregon, at the gallery on Saturday, February 3, from 4pm to 6pm.
Matthew Picton, St. Peter’s Basilica, 2023, archival paper, archival photographs, 80 x 60 inches
In the exhibition A Seeker’s Paradise, a collection of exquisitely layered and hand-cut mixed media works, artist Matthew Picton traces the evolution of cities and empires through an approach that integrates history and politics with art and architecture. Picton creates an awareness of historical patterns and repetitions through pieces that reference and mirror each other. The legendary descent into the splendid decadence of Ancient Rome is juxtaposed with the equally excessive later years of the commercial empires of Venice and London. And the shorter lived worlds of Mobutu Sese Seko’s Zaire are placed next to the extravagance of the self-exiled Portuguese royal court in Rio de Janeiro. The show also includes works that reference Vatican City and Mecca, two of the world’s most significant religious power centers and pilgrimage sites that are the spiritual focal points for billions of people seeking a connection with the eternal.
Matthew Picton, Mecca, 2022, archival photographs, Yupo paper, Copic inks, 56 x 56 x 3 inches
Picton, through his highly original visual narrative, explores how leaders and their followers often seek to establish some sort of paradise on earth but often end up in disillusionment, leaving room for the next generation. The artist makes connections between how rulers seek to embellish and demonstrate their magnificence through art, costume, ceremony, and flamboyant parade. He aims to present how power is made visible and architecture bears witness and provides the symbols of the afterlife, authority, paradise, and the keys to eternity.
Matthew Picton, Venice, “Casanova,” 2016, archival boards, inks, photographs and film posters, 54 x 81 x 5.5 inches
Picton delves into the history of a multitude of charismatic visionaries, prophets, conquerors, ideologues, and leaders attempting to either fulfill a personal quest or to organize others to create their dream. His works reference patriarchal figures who had imagined themselves to have a connection with the destiny of history and thought themselves in charge of the betterment of their nation or humankind.
Matthew Picton, Suffering Widens, 2022, archival prints, 24 x 20 x 3 inches
“The greatest and most sublime creations of religious architecture contain both the aspirations for the divine and have also been associated with repression and control,” says Picton. “Human contemplation of the divine has produced works of art that have the transcendent harmony of Michelangelo and Bernini’s Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome, and the sublime perfection of the great ceiling of the Sheik Lotfollah mosque in Isfahan designed by Sheikh Bahai. In the art of these places there existed a harmony in contrast to the discordant nature of human society.”
Matthew Picton, photo by Claire Burbridge
Matthew Picton studied politics and history at the London School of Economics at the end of the 1970s. Picton has been a full time artist since 1996 and has exhibited his work since 1998. He has had numerous solo shows in San Francisco, Los Angeles, London, New York, Portland, and Miami. His work is included in the collections of The Jordan Schnitzer Museum, Crocker Art Museum in Sacramento, The De Young Museum, The Portland Art Museum, The Herbert Art Museum in Coventry, UK, and the Stadt Museum, Dresden. His commissioned artworks are in the collections of Facebook in Seattle, Google in Redwood City, The Chan Zuckerberg Foundation, The Address Hotel in Dubai, and The Schnitzer Collection in Portland, among others. He has also been the recipient of the Jurors Grand prize in The Portland Biennial and was awarded a Henry Moore purchase grant. His work has been reviewed in a great many publications, such as Artforum, Art Week, Art News, ARTillery, San Francisco Chronicle, and Los Angeles Times. Matthew Picton lives and works with his wife, fellow British artist, Claire Burbridge in Ashland, Oregon.
A Seeker’s Paradise is Matthew Picton’s second solo exhibition at Nancy Toomey Fine Art.
