Matthew Eguavoen

Matthew Eguavoen (born 1988), is a rising contemporary artist from Edo State, currently living in the city of Lagos, Nigeria. He attended the University of Port Harcourt , where he attained a Bachelors in Engineering for Civil Engineering and Structures. In his final year at the university of Port Harcourt, Matthew decided to pursue his passion for creating art through self-study, where he continued his artistic development.

Matthew is a full-time contemporary painter, he depicts his figurative and portrait subjects using a combination of oil paint, acrylic paint, charcoal, and graphite pencils to document stories that encompass the emotions and demeanor of his muse to the viewer of his work.

Matthew uses his work to address the societal, economic, and political views across the complex intersectionality that Nigerians face in different facets of life. The constraint of societal ideology about life, on human existence and survival.

His work addresses the impact of Slavery on the Africa and its people, the extinction of African traditional values and the growing sensation of religion in Africa, importation of western moral and cultural values to Africa and exiling Africa’s own cultural values as a people, with Africans abandoning Africa for relative greener pastures in western countries.

Matthews works are featured in collections across West Africa, USA, Europe, and North America.