'The Explainers' featuring the work of Matthew Monteith

Galleries, museums and exhibitions spaces are created to house what we commonly think of as invaluable, irreplaceable works of art. These spaces are in fact sites for the transference of ideas, ideas that are reliant on art objects to be brought into our consciousness. Teachers, docents and guides play key roles in this process. I am fascinated with the art of explanation, the moment when one individual, using their own knowledge of an object, both conceptual and historical takes on the task of animating that story and attempts to plant the seed of that idea into the minds of others. These ideas morph into new ideas and ultimately into new works. The following photographs explore that territory of quasi-magical transfer of ideas through the act of explanation.

__

Matthew Monteith studied at the International Center of Photography before earning an MFA from the Yale School of Art in 2004. He was a Fulbright Scholar in the Czech Republic from 2001-2002 and the resulting work was published as Czech Eden by Aperture in 2007. He was a resident at the Marie Walsh Sharpe Foundation in New York City in 2004-05 and received the Abigail Cohen Rome Prize in Photography from the American Academy in Rome in 2008. His editorial work has appeared in many magazines, including GQ, The New York Times Magazine, Interview, W, andDwell. His work has been exhibited in solo exhibitions in New York, San Francisco, Kyoto, Paris, Arles, and Cherbourg as well as in group exhibitions in New York, Charlotte, Miami, Washington D.C., Rennes, Ljubljana, Prague, and Rome. He is currently Assistant Professor of Photography at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design in Boston. He lives and works in Boston and New York.