Matthew Kolodziej

(Charlottesville, Virginia, 1967 - )

North America, American

Matthew Kolodziej uses painting and drawing to explore the ways space effects perception. He documents construction and demolition sites through photographs and sketches, digitally collages the images, and projects and traces them onto canvas before adding paint. Kolodziej earned a BA in economics from the University of Chicago in 1988 and an MFA in painting from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1993. His long held interest in archeology led him to travel to England on a Fulbright Scholarship in 1995 to explore prehistoric ruins. Kolodziej began teaching at the Myers School of Art at the University of Akron in 2001, where he is now professor of art. In 2007, he founded UA’s Synapse, a series of exhibitions, lectures and workshops on topics overlapping art and science. Along with faculty in biology, polymer science and engineering, he helped develop UA’s Center for Biomimicry Research, which was founded in 2012. A 2008 resident of the Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center, Kolodzei received a 2007 Individual Excellence Award from the Ohio Arts Council and a Pollock Krasner Grant in 2009. His work has been exhibited at the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland, the Rose Art Museum and Rockford Art Museum.

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