Matthew Quick

Matthew was recently featured in Business Review Weekly as one of Australia’s top 50 artists.

In the last 4 years he has either won, or been selected as a finalist in, almost 40 major national art awards, including the Redland Art Award, the Paddington Art Prize, the City of Albany Art Prize, the Blake Prize Director’s Cut, the Black Swan Prize for Portraiture, the Townsville Open Art Award, the Duke Art Prize, the John Leslie Art Prize, the Churchie and the Prometheus.

He began painting as a teenager but for a long time was distracted by other careers – he’s worked variously as a university lecturer, copywriter, life model, cleaner, salesman, art-director, photographer & writer. His first novel, Of Gods & Ordinary Monsters, was short-listed for the Vogel Literature Award.

Matthew’s paintings have been used as book covers by Penguin Books & Era Publications. Other works have been purchased by Bayside City Council, Sheraton Hotels, the Metropolitan Fire Brigade, Mars Corporation, Marriott Hotels, Kodak, The Department of State Development, Peddle Thorpe Architects, Westfield, NSW Railways, Playboy and Australia Post.

His work has been reproduced in many magazines, books and journals including Communication Arts, Idea, Design World, Graphis & Novum. His art has received numerous awards including several MADC awards and from the prestigious “One Show” in New York.

Matthew has resided in the UK, Portugal & Malaysia and once camped out for several months underneath a grand piano. He has spent nights under stars in India, under ground in Bolivia, under guard in Burma and under nourished in London. His scariest moment was having machine-gun shoved in his face during Nepalese anti-monarchy riots, although crashing his para-glider into a forest was also something of a highlight.