Artist Statement 2024
I am interested in how reality is constructed through the manufacture of stories under the power of commercial prerogatives. Cast-off materials permit me to give new life to what otherwise would be dismissed as rubbish. My aim is increasingly to bridge the divide between the visual and literary arts.
My practice sometimes involves the use of watercolours and collage. The “paramontages” are professionally printed in Sydney. To make paramontages I repurpose photographs and leverage the functions of a package of free software – which is available for download on the internet without charge, a practice escaping the cash nexus, freeing creative impulses without the burden of financial outlay. Making creative montages with and without words but in both cases layering images and bands of pure colour.
Once upon a time I wrote a poem in heroic couplets that described the place where I grew up in Sydney as a tethered isle. Later lived in SE Queensland, describing the paperbark and magpie as totems of my spirit, the great thing about there – proximity to nature.
I wasn’t raised I grew up, there was a complete absence of love in my household as a boy. We had trees. The Moreton Bay fig in the garden at Vaucluse was easy and fun to climb. The flame trees in the park in front of the house blossomed red every year. I even had a familiar silver-dollar gum tree I would climb so as to be at the same level as the upstairs segment of the house, where my parents had their focus. Thinking back now it was the tree that allowed me to experience a form of intimacy with people who did everything possible to avoid spending time with us.
Me and my brother. Wild children.
Website: matthewdasilva.com
Instagram: @matthewddasilva
Facebook: matthewdasilva
CV
Making watercolours since November 2022, I’ve held solo shows in Sydney (Australia) and Goulburn (regional New South Wales) and have been represented in group shows in Sydney and London. Will be in group shows in Brooklyn at Streeters Gallery (“Artistry Alchemy: Transformation on Canvas” 26-28 Mar 2025) and in Madrid at Artist Experience “Temporal ARTFAIR” run by Espacio Triple, 6-9 Mar 2025 at Santa Barbara Palace. I will have a solo show, ‘Exegesis’ in Marrickville in May 2025, Gallery 371.
I came to art following 35 years working in offices, mainly doing editorial work including desktop publishing but also including a stint freelancing as a journalist. I wanted to do art when I was a teenager but had a choice at school between studying French or art because of the timetable. Dad didn’t let me drop French so I went to uni, got a BA, started working, made a family and relocated to Japan for my career.
Once back home I completed a second degree, in journalism. In April 2022 I started making paramontages and in July that year established the Eastern Suburbs Art Group (Esag). “Paramontage” is a portmanteau word coined by an old school friend Andrew Adair, a poet, and describes works that are a synthetic combination of poetry and photographs. I have been writing poetry for almost 20 years and more recently enjoy a close association with Poets at Petersham Bowlo in Sydney.