Matthew Kolodziej

Title: Distinguished Professor
Dept/Program: Painting and Drawing
Office: Folk Hall 182
Phone: 330–972–6030
Email: mattk@uakron.edu
Website: http://www.mattpaint.com

Biography

Kolodziej earned a BA in economics from the University of Chicago in 1988 and an MFA in painting from Rhode Island School of Design in 1993. He has received a Fulbright and Pollock-Krasner award. Kolodziej took a position at the University of Akron in 2001. As a tenured Professor of Art at the University of Akron, Myers School of Art, he teaches painting and drawing. In 2007, he started Synapse, a series of lectures, workshops, exhibitions, and conversations about the intersection of science and art. In 2012, he joined forces with colleagues in polymer science, engineering and biology on a new initiative at the University of Akron to develop a Center for Biomimicry research.

The transitory quality of space and perception is a central theme in Kolodziej’s paintings. He uses images of architecture and landscape to explore the presence of change. Kolodziej’s process, akin to the way an archaeologist works, begins with documenting construction and demolition sites with photographs and drawings. These sources are in a state of transition. This documentation gives him a sense of the texture, physical structure, color, and light in the landscape. Like an archaeological site, the paintings present fragments and residues on the surface as evidence of intersections and structures. Kolodziej has been exhibiting his work since the mid 1980s. His work has been in exhibitions at the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Rockford Art Museum, the Akron Art Museum, the Rose Art Museum, and the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland. The William Busta Gallery in Cleveland represents his work.