22 July 2026
Artist Highlight - Matthew Morpheus
Interview and Review
Matthew Morpheus, also known as Serhii Matveichenko, is a Ukrainian artist whose work is characterized by an innovative approach to art. From an early age, he was deeply passionate about art, finding inspiration in his vibrant surroundings and rich cultural heritage.
Matthew Morpheus's works are known for their unique blend of graphic design, and collages. He creates a recognizable style that has brought him international acclaim and awards in major cities such as London, Beijing, Moscow, and New York.
Matthew Morpheus is often referred to as a "citizen of the world" because of his vast global influence and the diversity of cultural elements that are reflected in his art. His works can be seen as portraits of the modern world, full of contrasts, discoveries, and reflections on life in the 21st century.
In addition to his artistic achievements, Matthew Morpheus is also considered a philosopher of his time. His works, which delve into new cultural directions and unconventional genres, offer a deep understanding of modern society. Matthew Morpheus's art resonates with viewers around the world, making him a significant figure in the contemporary art scene.
Matthew Morpheus continues to push the boundaries of artistic expression, constantly exploring new themes and techniques. His journey as an artist is a testament to his unwavering dedication and passion for creativity.
ARTIST INTERVIEW
1. Your work moves between abstraction, graphic design, and collage. What draws you to this combination of visual languages?
For me, this hybrid language captures reality best - not as clean separate parts, but as a swirling interconnection of emotions and fragments, constantly reshaping themselves in the chaotic information stream we live in.
2. Your statement describes your work as reflecting the contrasts and discoveries of the 21st century. How do you translate the complexity of contemporary life into image making?
My greatest revelation has been discovering what I call “Zero Emotion.” A face may show only one feeling - fear, joy, sorrow, or compassion - while the inner world remains infinitely more complex. Within every soul, love and hatred, light and darkness, memory and desire exist together, constantly colliding and blending. From this tension emerges the deepest feeling: “Zero Emotion.” It is the silent center beneath all contradictions. Through my fragmentary art, I try to capture this hidden state - the moment when the invisible truth inside a person becomes visible.
3. Collage often brings together fragments that may not naturally belong together. How do you decide when different images, textures, or visual elements should meet within a work?
I allow intuition to lead the creative process. I combine fragments only when they create a specific emotional tension or psychological resonance - even if they seem contradictory at first.
I don’t seek logical harmony. My priority is inner truth. When fragments evoke a strong emotional response or reveal a hidden connection, they become part of the work. My collages are intense visual dialogues between chaos and order, past and present, destruction and rebirth.
4. Your practice has been described as holding a global and cross cultural sensibility. How does this sense of cultural layering shape the structure or atmosphere of your work?
Through years of travel and extended stays in different countries - Ukraine, Israel, Germany, and the UK - my work has become deeply shaped by multicultural experience. This gives rise to rich, multi-layered compositions in which fragments of diverse cultural memories intertwine. The resulting atmosphere is nomadic and unsettled, capturing the complex feeling of belonging everywhere and nowhere simultaneously.
5. Many of your works seem to sit between visual order and disruption. How important is tension within your compositions?
I intentionally create works that balance on the edge of order and chaos. Structured, almost architectural lines provide a sense of control, while explosive colors, fragmented shapes, and conflicting patterns introduce destruction and emotional intensity. This tension is the essence of my art. Real vitality arises in the moment when order is about to shatter and chaos has not yet won. Without it, the work is dead to me. I want the viewer to physically feel this struggle.
6. Abstraction can create space for interpretation rather than direct explanation. What do you hope viewers bring to the work when they encounter it?
Abstraction offers the viewer complete freedom - the freedom to see whatever resonates with them. This is its true power. One person may sense unease in my work, while another finds beauty and hope. Every reading is meaningful and valid. I never seek to dictate the meaning of my art. I prefer when viewers interpret the works themselves, discovering something profoundly personal in the process.
7. Your work often feels like a portrait of the modern world, rather than a portrait of a single person or place. How do you think about the relationship between abstraction and social observation?
My abstract works represent «Cartographies of the Infinite» - emotional maps of today’s world. Rather than painting individual people or places, I capture the shared psychological condition of our epoch: anxiety, acceleration, information excess, and a profound sense of instability. Abstraction enables me to perceive society through emotions and inner experiences rather than literal imagery. Ultimately, my pieces become a portrait not of one person, but of the age we collectively inhabit.
8. How do you approach colour, rhythm, and composition when building a new work? Do these elements begin intuitively, or do they develop through a more structured process?
I start from intuition: color, rhythm, and composition appear as an immediate instinct, a subtle feeling of balance or tension. After that, I shape them with greater precision, refining the structure until the piece feels finished and vibrant. Ultimately, the process becomes a fluid interplay between spontaneity and careful craftsmanship.
9. Your practice has received international recognition across different contexts. How do you feel your work changes when it is viewed by audiences from different cultural backgrounds?
I find it fascinating how my works “speak” differently across countries. Whether it’s Brazil, Canada, the United Kingdom,or China. The same piece can stir unease in one viewer and serenity in another. Every culture finds something of its own within them. To me, this is a reminder that true human emotions are universal, and my art can connect with people from completely different worlds.
10. Within your selected works, what ideas or questions do you feel are most important for viewers to spend time with?
Looking toward the future, I see my artistic evolution as a continuous journey of exploration and experimentation. My current practice merges traditional methods with contemporary elements, yet I feel driven to go further. I was fortunate to find like‑minded people at Abandoned Artist Group, with whom I can grow creatively. I’m fascinated by new media-digital art, virtual reality, and immersive technologies that expand what art can be. I also want to explore interconnectedness and how technology reshapes human relationships, perception, and truth. This direction resonates with what the modern viewer seeks.
TOO MUCH TO LOOK AT
Review by Sara Chyan, Curator
Matthew Morpheus fills his collages until almost every part of the image is occupied. Faces, buildings, cartoons, machines, religious references and fragments of advertising are brought into the same crowded space. Some elements are enlarged far beyond their original scale, while others are pushed into corners or partly covered. There is always more information than the eye can take in at once.
Although the compositions appear chaotic, they are not without structure. Matthew often places a figure or recognisable symbol near the centre, then surrounds it with smaller scenes competing for attention. In The King, the central body is staged almost like a ruler or circus master, but the surrounding tickets, performers and strange characters keep disturbing that authority. The figure occupies the middle without fully controlling the image.
This theatrical quality runs through much of the work. Curtains, stages, costumes and exaggerated gestures make public life appear as a performance in which politics, entertainment and commerce are difficult to separate. The humour is immediate, but it rarely feels relaxed. Something in the image is usually selling, warning, performing or demanding to be noticed.
Matthew calls the emotional condition behind the work “Zero Emotion”. I do not read this as an absence of feeling. The collages contain too many feelings for that. Excitement, fear, absurdity and aggression appear together until no single response can settle. The viewer may recognise individual images, but their original meaning becomes less secure once they are placed beside material carrying a completely different weight.
Digital collage allows Matthew to make these collisions unusually sharp. Edges can be cut cleanly, bodies can change scale without explanation and distant places can be placed beside one another without sharing the same perspective. The images do not need to pretend that they belong together. Their awkwardness is part of how the work describes contemporary visual culture.
Many of the collages are relatively small, yet they behave more like posters or overloaded screens. Their scale encourages close viewing, but moving closer does not necessarily bring clarity. New details continue to appear, and the relationship between them becomes harder rather than easier to resolve.
There is a limit to this density. When every part of an image is equally loud, political violence, popular entertainment and consumer imagery can begin to lose their differences. At times the work risks reproducing the same visual overload it is trying to examine. Yet that discomfort also feels honest. Online, material of very different importance already reaches us through the same screen and often within seconds of one another.
Matthew does not arrange this material into a clear judgement or a stable portrait of the present. He leaves the viewer inside the crowd of images, deciding where to look and how long to remain there. The difficulty is not that nothing can be understood. It is that everything arrives before there has been time to understand the thing that came before it.