Matthew Roby at Heartbeat Gallery 

Matthew Roby| ‘Walkies, Rex!’ | Mixed Media | 50cm

Heartbeat is pleased to present Matthew Roby’s first solo exhibition at the gallery.

Matthew Roby is an artist renowned for his darkly striking characters and visual narratives. Matt filters real life observations through his vivid imagination and blurs the boundaries between reality and make-believe. Taking familiar characters and creatures, Roby reinvents them and furnishes them with extraordinary personalities. The artwork is influenced by film and literature, with references to pop culture, everyday people and places.

For this exhibition, the artist showcases assorted paintings and illustrations alongside a motley menagerie of sculptures; assembled from metals, resin and junk objects.

Selected work also incorporates poetic and prose elements which Matt weaves into his imagery to reveal his appealing dark sense of humour. This is shown to full effect in his cursed tale, ‘The Fateful Fable of 13’, which visually depicts the downfall of 13 unfortunate individuals.

“I’ve always been intrigued by words and images, and how one influences the other. Narrative themes run through my imagery, and the ‘Fateful 13’ was born of my curiosity regarding superstition and fate. Do things really happen for a reason? Or are sequences of events entirely random? Are we in control of our destiny or is it already written?

These questions played a big part in the development of the characters and how they juxtaposed with one another. Like many of my creations, they’re flawed or outcast individuals, and life has dealt them a raw deal, be it by nurture or nature.

There’s usually a story behind my characters; a depth and personality that viewers can connect with, no matter how absurd they appear on first impression. Their personas are inspired from observations of people and their mannerisms. I like to emphasize little idiosyncrasies and exploit our tendency to over generalise these traits. The final appearance is exaggerated somewhat, to accentuate their personality.”
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