“I just do what I do. I like to make music.” Neil Young

Like his fellow countryman Neil Young, Matthew Feyld has a similar approach to the creative act; he does not attempt to deal with transcendental themes or reveal any kind of truth in his work. His paintings refer to nothing at all and allude no more than to painting itself. This is clear in his exhibition consisting of untitled works, which he has named “Paintings”.

It is in the simplicity of things that one sometimes makes the greatest insights. And that is what happens when we face Feyld’s work. The plainness of his paintings, in subdued colors, shaped in the form of dots or circles, calls our attention from afar. Just as a keyhole calls the attention of a child who wants to know what is hidden behind the closed door of a room, and slowly approaches it to discover through the small hole a whole world previously unknown to him. A new world that deserves to be observed with scientific rigour, of which he does not want to lose any detail and in which every centimetre of the new scene deserves to be observed with the same precision as the previous one.

Feyld’s paintings, strongly influenced by the pictorial minimalism of Agnes Martin or Frank Stella, are composed of superimposed layers of acrylic paint in different colors, arranged on the canvas by means of long, uninterrupted brushstrokes that seem to extend far beyond the surface that gives the piece its shape. And it is at this limit – where the edge of the work meets the void – that the viewer can witness the dialogue that the artist has held with the painting: adding layer after layer, until he has reached such a color that he is pleased with, and with which he has finished the work.

In an era characterized by the over-consumption of images, Matthew’s proposal seems to invite us to take a break from the frenzy of contemporary life, to stop and take a closer look at things. And just like that fascinated child looking through the keyhole, to let a new world open up before our eyes. A world in which it is possible to lose oneself in the color and materiality of painting, and forget everything else.

Enrique Suasi