Matthew Willie Garcia is a printmaker whose work moves far beyond the traditional print media, which includes screen printing, mokuhanga, projection-mapping, animation, and large-scale installation. Drawing on his love of science and science fiction, Garcia explore his queer existence and the unknowable qualities of the universe. Garcia uses his knowledge of printmaking to explore these themes through color abstraction, the graphic image, and nonrepresentational forms.

Garcia is a California born printmaker who is currently living and working in Kansas City, MO and Lawrence, KS. He received his B.F.A. in Printmaking from the Kansas City Art Institute and his M.F.A. from the University of Kansas. Garcia has shown his work regionally throughout the Midwest. Most notably his work was included as part of the "Queer Abstraction" exhibition at the Nerman Contemporary Museum of art, "Star Children" exhibition at the Bradbury Art Museum and was featured at Des Moines Arts Center as part of the “Immersive” exhibition. His work has also been shown internationally as part of “Sumi-Fusion” Mokuhanga exhibition in Nara, Japan and the 2022 On Paper exhibition in Barcelona, Spain. Garcia is currently the Studio Manager at the Lawrence Arts Center in Lawrence, KS.

Artist Statement:

As queer people we often find home in unconventional places. For me, I found my home in the pages of comic books and Sci-fi novels. My work is derived from this yearning to find a home and/or space to exist. Drawing on the power of science fiction and the ambiguity of abstraction, I create realities that are free from the constraints of this world. 

I draw on ideas from quantum mechanics, cosmology and astrophysics in the creation of these imagined spaces and narratives that speculate about our place in the universe. These grand ideas are couched in bold, vibrant, and colorful graphic prints, paintings and installations that draw inspiration from marvel comics, manga, Japanese prints and western animation. 

My work strives to transform our notion of existence and recontextualize our ideas of space and time. Ultimately striving to ask questions about the universe that might not have straightforward answers while reorienting the notion of space, exploration, and of one's place in the vastness of the universe.