A native of Upstate New York, Matt Ballou was educated at The School of The Art Institute of Chicago (BFA 2001) and Indiana University ( MFA 2005) before coming to The University of Missouri, where he is now a Professor of Painting and Drawing. Skilled in the use of both representational imagery and abstraction, Ballou has most recently adapted his surfaces, formats, and frames to form compositions that are physically and metaphorically deeply layered in a series titled WHENEVERwhen. Diverse media and techniques including oil and oil pastel, spray paint, collage, and relief cutting build into an accumulated effect with intentional imbalance and dense activity. Bursting with chromatic intensity, these works are artifacts of exploration, distillations of influence, and tributes to rigorous play.
