Matt Godden is an Australian artist with a wide-ranging practice covering sculpture, photography and graphic novels.
He explores various ideas through these different mediums. In sculpture, his work is primarily concerned with concepts of restriction and the enablement it provides, and the material beauty of obsolete discarded technology, especially when used in an organic context. His photographic work has varied from the visceral and personal of his medically-themed Nervous Spaces project, through to a long-term obsession with uncovering the unseeable geometry of urban landscapes, as revealed in panoramic imagery. In graphic novels, Matt takes advantage of the opportunity to combine unambiguous narrative with imagery, exploring ideas about technology, society and the possibilities of a post-biological human future in Surfing The Deathline, and the experience of the artist in the autobiographical work The Metaning.
Matt has a Bachelor of Fine Art in Sculpture from the National Art School, where he was awarded the Sydney Olympic Park Sculpture Residency, and is a past recipient of the Australia Council’s ArtStart Grant, and Arts Queensland’s stART Grant.
His background is in design, mac-geekery, and education – including teaching at the Art Gallery of NSW as a part of the 2007 Osamu Tezuka exhibition.
In 2019, Matt travelled to Japan, visiting both the Osamu Tezuka Museum, and taking a private tour of the premier Bonsai nurseries in Saitama, including many closed to the public, who were astoundingly generous in allowing Matt to photograph their collections for research purposes. During this trip, he was fortunate to meet Masahiko Kimura during a visit to his private nursery, be photographed next to his most famous works, and was granted special permission to see a fish pond that will forever remain one of the most amazing sights he has ever seen. In addition, he visited the nursery / museum of Kunio Kobayashi, another of the towering geniuses of Bonsai, and an enthusiastically jolly host.
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