Life & Work with Matte Refic

Today we’d like to introduce you to Matte Refic.

Hi Matte, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today.
When I was 10 years old, I heard the streets calling loud and clear. Graffiti had found its way into my heart; the train yards, the underpasses, and the alleyways were where I wanted to be. Maybe it was a broken home life or a natural tendency to rebel, but the writing on the walls had found my heart and there it has remained. Graffiti was the gateway to adventures, an advanced education for all who dare to play, and the expression of myself. Graffiti showed me the ways of living outside the social norms, how to exist out of sight, how to explore creative expressions, and discover places that few people ever get to see. It also taught me how to navigate the streets, it taught me respect, and it was graffiti that brought me into my first jail cells and prison. Graffiti defined my youth and my primary education.

My love for the streets and my focus on the arts expanded as I matured. Graffiti transformed into mural art, illustrations, design, and teaching. It then turned into a multi-disciplinary art practice that includes performance art, dancing, and music making. My rebellious nature had taken the form of being a dedicated artist.

The main thing the streets taught me is that what you say is what you get, and what you see is what you become. Our visual landscapes, and the individual stories we tell, personal and collective, are what define our community. With this understanding came the knowledge that if I were to be making art for the community, I had to be very mindful of how my creative decisions were attracting attention and altering the city. As I am to be making additions to our visual landscape I have to think about how I want to affect my community. I realized that as an artist it was important for me to bring forth ideas and imagery which were to uplift and inspire the community. It became my responsibility to bring forth imagery that brings healing and love.

Southern Colorado, the Lower Arkansas Valley, is one of the densest prison populations on earth. Home sweet home.
In 2016, I began facilitating art and self-expression classes in the federal prison system. Teaching weekly at all levels of security, minimum all the way up the “Supermax” where I have primarily been sharing. Through this experience, I have seen the power that art has to transform environments and individuals. This has been the greatest achievement of my artistic career. The lessons that the streets, the arts, and the prisons have taught me are that by stepping into what we fear most and expressing what we experience, we can heal. We are as one, and for each of us to look within, explore, and express is to heal us all.

This path of creative self-discovery and community participation is now the primary focus of my work. As my artistic preferences develop, I am most interested in how creativity and self-expression are used as methods for healing individuals, families, and entire communities.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
The path of an artist, my path anyway, is filled with so many bumps, holes, obstacles, detours, breakdowns, and struggles. This, to me, has been what gives life its great texture and leads to the most enriching experiences. It’s the challenges and struggles that, with persistence, we overcome. These same challenges lead to the wisdom that becomes our creative energy, our loving natures. Managing creative energy along with financial responsibilities is always a massive challenge. When we decide to do art as a profession, it comes with waves of successes and failures. When we then experience this process as a living being with ego, waves of euphoria and depressions mark the beginnings and endings of creative cycles.

In my 20-plus-year career, I have experienced so many challenges and felt so many successes, but in the end, I think it’s the things we overcome that truly define what we are creating. If not for the struggles, the stories we tell would be so dull. And what are we but a collection of stories? If we examine our stories and not be the victim of them, but the architect, then the hard times become the fuel for what beauty we all can create.

As I learned of the prison of the mind, I came to find the greatest benefit in exploring the “cells” of our mental processes. In examining the looping thoughts of what we think, we find who we are. It is here where we discover how we are trapped. It is here, in this work, where we grow. So yes, there are struggles, and on the human journey, we observe the struggles and decide how we are to deal with them. And now in life, in my personal practice, I look for those bumps in the road, and I create ways I can express and mend.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
My art practice is multi-disciplinary, comprising drawing, painting, performance art, avant-garde music, public speaking, and teaching. Primarily, my professional practice is mural making, sign painting, and teaching. My personal artwork has moved largely towards performance art, which is a combination of all of my art practices into one.

The many murals which I have painted, especially around Pueblo are most what I am known for locally, though the prison art program is my biggest passion and to me, it is what affects people in the biggest way.

Being able to maintain a consistent art practice for decades is what I am most proud of. At a certain point when we are exploring self-expression, we are just documenting the moments in time, and for me, looking back on all the time I have had the privilege to be making art has been such a blessing.

Comparing myself to others is not really something I do. But what I find to be most important in my art practice is the consistency of showing up. I think that confronting challenging and often scary situations through my art brings me the most satisfaction and the biggest sense of accomplishment.

If you had to, what characteristic of yours would you give the most credit to?
Grit. We can never give up, as long as we live. If we choose to be the creators, it’s not about ‘“success” or “failure” it’s about waking up each day and finding creative ways to spend our time.

We can make the things that bring us joy. We take on the work of healing, seeking the path of peace by deciding that in this brief life we are going to be ourselves, not what others tell us we are supposed to be.

Contact Info:

• Website:www.matterefic.com
• Instagram: @matte_refic
• Youtube: @refic