Matthew Dennison is a lifelong animal lover who spends as much time in nature as he can. While animals appear in his paintings of human scenes, part of his work is also devoted to portraits of animals alone. In these paintings, familiar forest mammals and birds are sometimes pictured in full, within their natural environment. More often, only their heads are represented, frequently in profile, against a monochrome background, thereby emphasizing the flat plane of the canvas. Somewhat stylized, these portraits are not strictly naturalistic. However, whether of a quadruped or bird, each succeeds in suggesting an individuality and, especially through the rendering of the animal’s gaze, in expressing an emotion, a mood, or a personality trait that we also recognize as human. Dennison’s medium is oil, and
his primary tools are not brushes but his gloved hands, rags, masking tape, and even paper, used to manipulate the oil paint and score the surface. Born and raised in Portland, he began drawing, painting, and carving at an early age. He briefly studied at the Pacific Northwest College of Art in Portland. Besides painting and carving, he maintains a daily ritual that involves both drawing and poetry writing, in order to document what he experiences. His work has been exhibited nationally and is in numerous Northwest collections.