Artist Bio and Statement

Raised in the East Bay Area of California and currently based in Austin, Matthew Stanners is a 29-year-old artist whose work emerges from the intersection of philosophical inquiry and abstract expression. His journey into fine art began not in the studio, but in the texts of classical philosophy, which first opened his eyes to the power of abstraction as a means of exploring the human condition.

A pivotal influence came early at university when he encountered Mark Rothko’s Seagram Murals. This encounter catalyzed his own creative discipline, one shaped by a deep interest in the emotional and psychological resonance of late-modern abstraction and surrealism. While studying finance and entrepreneurship at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, he immersed himself in the history and theory of these movements, finding in their evolution a visual vocabulary for engaging states of memory, desire, and transcendence.

Since graduating in 2019, he has been creating and exhibiting paintings that seek to evoke something both intimate and expansive—spaces where stillness and complexity can coexist. His work has been shown in San Francisco, New York, and Austin through exhibitions that aim to not only present paintings but create immersive, dynamic environments for reflection and dialogue.

He continues to explore the shifting relationship between form, perception, and meaning—always in pursuit of the moment when color becomes experience and the viewer is transformed.