Matthew Mattingly

Monday, April 22, 2024

Racor switch

I sketched this endearing personage on a walk today. Subsequently learned that it is a Racor switch.

Ink and watercolor sketch of railroad switch mechanism incorporating a yellow handle and vertical shaft with a red arrow and green circle mounted at right angles.

Sunday, April 21, 2024

Power plant

I've done this power plant a few times looking south from a ways up the river, but yesterday I found myself right opposite it, and did this watercolor sketch.

Monday, April 15, 2024

Mount Toby

A nice in just spring day so I biked up to Mount Pollux and did this watercolor sketch of Mount Toby.

watercolor of distant mountain against partly cloudy sky, hills covered in bare trees and evergreens in foreground.

Tuesday, April 9, 2024

I think this is the final state for the plate. Not that it couldn't be improved, but there are flaws that have been baked in from its inception and that will likely get worse with each trip through the ferric chloride. I've also done a lot of scraping and burnishing and filled some unintentional pock marks with epoxy. Next step is to work on the printing part - using inking, wiping, and printing to get a consistent, predictable result so as to be able to print an edition. I've learned a lot from this first attempt at a larger scale, complex image which I'll apply to the next one.

Etching of streetcar interior with pensive man in foreground, mother reading large book wile her daughter looks on, other passengers in background.

Moon, mountains, humans

We went up north to see the eclipse! I got a decent-ish shot of the totality by holding a phone camera filter (which didn't work with my admittedly old phone) up in front of my real camera. While waiting, I did a watercolor sketch of the mountains and some vignettes of my fellow humans gathering for the event.

watercolor panographic view of mountains with light snow on peaks and ski trails

page of pen and ink sketches of people holding large binoculars, setting up cameras, walking dog, mother helping daughter with coat, lounging chair group

pen and ink sketches of people - pregnant mother and young son sitting on wall, serious people with telescopes and tripods

Saturday, April 6, 2024

MICAfest 2024

M/others Institute for Collaboration and Art presents MICAfest 2024

MICAfest 2024 Art for Change: The M/others’ View

Visual/Performing/Literary Arts

I’m a Featured Artist!

80 m/other artists

May 1-31, 2024

Northampton, MA

Tickets for MICAfest are now open!

experiencemica.org/micafest-2024-northampton-ma/

My pieces, Three Women and Sunscreen, will be on display at Bombyx Center for Arts & Equity in the Peacock Room.

Oil painting of three women on a porch, representing three generations. The daughter looks into the picture, across a valley with an old brick mill town with a Florentine tower. In the distance a thunder cloud looms. The mother is busy hanging a sheet on a clothes line, her gaze directed across the picture. The grandmother looks out of the picture, meeting our eyes with a quizzical expression.

Pastel painting of mother applying sunscreen to little daughter's nose. Behind them, a very large wave is breaking

Thursday, March 28, 2024

Abandoned golf course

Took the bike out to the abandoned golf course, which was partly flooded from recent rains, and did this sketch of ex-farm buildings, subsequently repurposed by a landscaping company. Actually the golf course is also in the process of being repurposed as a recreational area/solar farm, so may lose its wild and melancholy aspect.

Ink drawing of barn, top of silo, and farm buildings seen from across an overgrown and partly flooded foreground

Pen, inkwash, white gouache and white Sakura Gellyroll pen on toned paper.

4" x 6"