Matthew Cheyne is a Queensland-based artist working across oil painting, drawing and sculpture. After graduating from the Queensland College of Art in 2001, Cheyne also undertook studies in film and literature.
His practice combines oil painting with hyper-colour drawing, exploring figurative subjects through dark humour, vibrant colour and abstracted backgrounds. His works depict a diverse range of subjects, including volcanoes, street hawkers, looters, people and the built environment.
Cheyne’s paintings often place colourful, playful imagery in tension with their subject matter. Recurring volcano imagery, which the artist describes as “nature’s middle-finger to bucolic landscape painting”, is rendered in unexpected candy pinks and serene indigo tones.
Although figurative at heart, Cheyne’s compositions feature atmospheric, abstracted backgrounds that invite viewers to interpret and complete the scenes. His approach is also informed by his colour blindness.
After spending several years living in Germany and France, where he exhibited regularly in Cologne, Berlin and Luxembourg, Cheyne is now based in Queensland. His work has been exhibited at Casula Powerhouse in Sydney, the Australian National Archives in Canberra, and numerous commercial and public galleries.
