A reader asks Matt whether he has had the artist equivalent of “writer’s block.”

Matt responds: 

I’ve never had artist’s block.  I’ve always been assaulted by all these notions and realities of the spirits wanting to be heard.

In the past, I did have a feeling of, “Why in the hell am I making all these paintings?  Why am I delving into all these plusses and minuses of canvases and wood and paper and tin and anything else I could change in some way, shape, or form?”

I especially had these thoughts when no one was looking at my art.  There were many years when the only people who looked at my art were myself and the photographer who photographed it.  I longed for a bird or a dog to sing to it or bark at it.  But to be an artist is a lonely profession.  So it was just me, the art, and the walls.  But I had to do it.  If I didn’t do it, I would have been extremely unhappy.  It’s like sitting at home wondering, “Why the hell do I have to keep breathing?”

The intensity of inquisitiveness to try to pull out of yourself something that portrays something you’re not actually too sure about at that moment, and to try to find the answer—to put it in some sort of form that speaks back to you, because it probably knows more than you do—is probably why I love the movie The Wizard of Oz:  We’re off to see the Wizard, the wonderful Wizard of Oz!  I get up in the morning looking for the Wizard.  Some days I find him.

I’m getting to the point where I don’t care whether people love my art, hate it, cherish it, throw up on it, or whatever.  Just the powerful emotional living and pleasure I get from doing it, is as much to me as breathing.  It must be done to stay alive.  I enjoy every last second of it.  That’s probably why I hate to go to sleep.  And when I get up, as soon as I go through my routine for the day, I can’t wait to get to the studio and start living. 

Matt