Matt Underwood Nature’s Artist

I’m guessing that Matt Underwood is a man who spends a lot of his time amongst nature. Born in 1971, Matt’s curiosity about natural history lead to him drawing and keeping sketchbooks from an early age. He went on to study art and art history at Salisbury College of Art and then to Carmarthenshire College of Art to study wildlife illustration, completing his HND in illustration with a distinction. He creates beautiful artwork in a few different mediums. Paintings …

Which often come from his observational sketching and watercolours.

He is involved with The Artists for Nature Foundation (ANF) which is a unique non-profit organisation that aims to combine art, nature conservation and education through the work of some of the world’s finest contemporary wildlife and landscape artists.

Matt is also well known for his love of painted miniatures, he paints within a 10 by 10 cm border and even makes the gilded frames himself. Realising that his long name takes up a lot of room on such a small space, he signs them simply with an ‘M’.

He says ” I’m very fond of Dutch still life paintings and like the way that butterflies, wasps, snails and bees seem to wander into them. It’s something I like to do too, so I often include small creatures that visit me while I paint. Landscape painting has always fascinated me. I like to get a feel for the place before I begin to paint, many of my landscape paintings are of places that I know well or are places that I’ve enjoyed exploring. My miniature paintings are widely collected and I’ve had successful exhibitions in Amsterdam. I’ve also exhibited  at  The Medici Gallery, The Llewellyn Alexander Gallery, and The Royal Academy Summer Exhibition. Here’s a selection, and you can view more here.

For me his purest work is captured in his softly multicoloured wood block prints. I love the textures and woody graininess that appears amongst his flowers and birds.

This wren reminds me of some of the Polish matchbox covers I’ve seen in the past. Great colours.

Misses Dunnock, the Robin, young Wren and the Owls, I’ve too many favourites !

I caught up with Matt to ask him a few questions.

How much of your time do you spend outdoors, sketching and painting ?

Many thanks Matt for answering my questions and agreeing to show your work on Fishink Blog.

You can find some of Matt’s fabulous prints over on his Folksy Site.