My interest lies in seeking that phenomenal contemporary blend of synthetic perfection in which the seemingly young and modern is a mere guise for a gaping hole, desperately longing for a rich past only to wallow in a contemporary void. – Matt Lucas

Matt Lucas combines redefined and manipulated images from pop culture and art history, his own photographs, and reappropriated personal photographs taken by others to create a meticulous and ambitious installation that consumes the gallery space. This process employs his own visual language owing in equal parts to contemporary masters who first conquered the objective organization of photographic realities, to mad scientists using scientific formulae and experiments to prove the improbable and to a technology that constantly seeks to undermine traditional use of time and language.

Familiar iconic images that have peppered modern art history have been abstracted, becoming visually stunning symbolic icons so that they remain familiar but not immediately recognizable. The result is an inverted yet strangely familiar parallel art universe. Lucas’ goal is to develop and perfect a personal and introspective style of conceptual photography, focusing on describing society objectively through its artifacts, individuals, and landscapes. The inclusion of a shell of a video game machine with a video loop of Mr. Lucas playing solitaire and then cheating to win sums up the exhibit: at once a knowing wink at the overly zealous self-proclaiming geniuses of the art world and a bold assertion of his place among them