Andrew Alan Matthews first burst onto the Manchester art scene with his exhibition at Salford Museum and Art Gallery last year. We speak to him about his life inspirations and where you can next see his work in person.
Andrew is one of many artists living in Manchester. Dubbed the creative capital of the UK earlier this year, Manchester has an estimate of 111 creatives per 10,000 residents living within the city. This includes artists, musicians and writers each with their own inspirations behind their work. Andrew aims to reach people through his own personal experiences ranging from his formative years to dealing with mental health.
With work heavily inspired by L.S Lowry’s paintings, Andrew’s passion for art blossomed from the age of five. His previous careers involved working in the textile industry producing fine art, and now he has turned his dream of being an artist into his reality.
As someone who was raised in the city, and continues to live in its’ parameters, Manchester has been a major influence across many of Andrew’s collections. When speaking about his past works, he states: “My favourite artwork is ‘Urbis and Printworks by night’” which depicts the iconic venue alongside the Football Museum.
He continues: “My favourite collection is my Moss Side Nostalgia collection as it has paintings and stories of growing up in Moss Side.”
Andrew has even put his life experience into a poem and painting, ‘I did it my way in a Mancunian town’.
Andrew is also a proud advocate for mental health, something he struggles with himself. He was diagnosed with mild paranoia and schizophrenia at age 28, a condition approximately 85 in 10,000 people suffer from.
After a former colleague laced his cake with laxatives with work, Andrew acted “completely out of [my] nature” and returned the favour, resulting in guilt and paranoia, which then became a huge influence on his latest ‘Stress and Anxiety’ collection.
Andrew states, “One thing I have learnt is to not act on anger but control your feelings and be more positive and try not let negativity get you down in life”.
He continues: “Every time you think of paranoid schizophrenia you think of a mass murdering wielding psychopath who is going to come kill you. But that is nothing like me.”
Andrew since devoted an entire collection ‘Stress and Anxiety’ to express his struggles. One of his most powerful pieces, according to Andrew, would be ‘I am not a number?’ “I am not a number, I am a man with feelings, thoughts and emotions… I am free to choose my path in life and I choose to do positive things with it.”
The power of this collection has benefited a lot more than just Andrew. He explains: “the Unite Union have used my work stress images in their training and development department to have people overcome stress at work” – ‘Unite the Union’ are an an organisation which promote equal rights for workers nationwide.
And Andrew proves this by everything he has managed to accomplish in his artistic career so far, including hosting his own pop-up stalls and exhibition coming mid-September.
Taking place at Stanley Square in Sale, just a 20-minute tram ride from the city centre, Andrew will be selling some of his original work, with limited edition prints and t shirts up for grabs too.
He says: “I decided to do a pop-up stall in Sale as it is close to where I live and work. And thought it would be good to let people know about my artwork and being a local Mancunian artist.”
After arranging his own pop-up stall with Stanley Square manager, Tony Martin, he was also offered a spot on the square to host yet another exhibition of his work, on Monday 9 September 2024.
“The exhibition in September will showcase Manchester scenes including Manchester City and Manchester United paintings.”
There will also be Andrew’s interpretations of some of Manchester’s most iconic scenes, such as ‘Printworks’ – where both the original and A3 prints are for sale, ‘Granada TV Studios by night’, which was inspired by his past line of work as a tour assistant at the venue, and ‘Mancunian Way’, one of the busiest roads in and out of the city, so his devotion to Manchester really speaks for itself.
Andrew has made a huge impact to our community throughout his artistic career. His piece, ‘The Manchester Postman’ was donated and raised money for Manchester charity, Blood Bikes. He has also attempted to preserve some of Salford’s pubs with his art, and most recently has donated a portrait of Salford boxer Len Johnson, in hopes to raise enough money to put up a statue of him, helping Len’s memory live on.
His exhibition will be on showcase in Sale’s Stanley Square in September. Find out more information about Andrew and his art here, and as his motto states, “BEE positive”.
For more interviews with people from across Manchester, see our page here.