Mixing It Up

Matthew Brandt isn’t afraid to try a little bit of everything to produce his photographic works of art.

- Jack Neubart

CAN YOU PICTURE YOURSELF BURYING a C-print in the ground halfway around the world? Or perhaps dunking a print in a lake, processing a print with tar from the La Brea Tar Pits, or streaming electricity through an entire photo exhibit interconnected with live wires to switch on a light bulb? And all for the sole purpose of artistic expression? That defines the uniquely imaginative and forward-thinking work of Matthew Brandt.

Brandt leaves no stone unturned when it comes to his experimental photography with mixed media. Each print is a unique form of expression—a one of a kind, never to be repeated. Granted, they’re not all successes. And perhaps the analogy is a bit far-fetched, but hearing Brandt proclaim “It’s alive!” as Dr. Frankenstein did when his creature came to life is not outside the bounds of imagination when success is at hand and a print becomes gallery-worthy. Each print does in fact take on a life of its own once the finished artwork sees the light of day.

THE BACKSTORY 

Matthew Brandt grew up surrounded by an appreciation for photography. His father, David Allan Brandt, a highly successful commercial photographer, is known for his elaborate, imaginative sets. The younger Brandt apparently absorbed some of that, but like the evolutionary tree, branched off in an entirely different direction, giving birth to some unusual twists and turns en route to finding his own artistic vision.

Additional influences played a role in shaping Matthew Brandt’s graphic style of photography. Photographers he worked with or studied under while at Cooper Union or UCLA, where he earned his master’s degree, include Robert Polidori, James Welling, and Walid Raad.