Mack Mathod Cambridgeshire, United Kingdom
I am based in Cambridgeshire and am Fine Art trained. I have spent most of my life involved in humourous and absurdist activities. Although, not necessarily a two-dimensional artist, my absurd and stupid ideas stumble along various artistic pathways, whether white wall gallery, sculpture, installation, video pastiche poetry and/or performance. Medication helps.
I have been an absurdist all of my life, in that I enjoy the juxtaposition of the bizarre and unexpected in the world around me.
In the seventies, after leaving Leeds College of Art, I worked in absurd performances all over the country. I have been a comedy scriptwriter, performer, director, and educator and, over the past ten years have been manipulating ideas through found images. There is nothing complicated about my work. It has little meaning and has a silly absurdity at its core.
Do not be fooled into thinking the work is facile and shallow. There is a serious motive in attempting to amuse and brighten an audience’s artistic experience and, in so doing, question the often over serious sobriety of contemporary artistic methodology. I repurpose long forgotten, photographic memories and give them a new life and a new humourous history. I also perform ridiculous instructional pieces eg. "How to improve flower arranging with ukulele, sausages and goldfish" (performed Manchester 2016).
“Mack Mathod’s work presents a humourous way of repurposing objects and materials that have had a previous life. They have been brought into the contemporary by re-presenting them in response to current daily life. He is also playing on historical and museum contexts and display by presenting them in such a way as to make them appear truthful remnants of history. While performing as serious and factual, this work is imbued with comical wit and absurdity. Its playful grave humour is reflective and pokes fun at the way we take art and art practice so seriously.”
(Citation for Best Newcomer Award at the Open Biennial Exhibition, City Gallery, Peterborough )
