Matt Watt (b. 2002) is a conceptual artist from South Africa. His practice exists somewhere between performance, publication, documentation, and institutional mischief. If it feels like he’s simultaneously mocking and committed to what you’re looking at, thats probably the point.
Watt’s work explores structures of power, post-apartheid paranoia, the aesthetics of effort, and the performance of sincerity in contemporary art. He is interested in failure as a formal strategy, in irony when it exhausts itself, and in systems that try (and inevitably fail) to mean something. His projects often disguise themselves — sometimes as parties, posters, chairs, instagram posts, branded hats, or taxidermy animals — leaving it up to the viewer to untangle his intention.
Watt’s work treats the art world as a site of performance. His installations, events, and object-based works frequently collapse into the conditions they critique. It is unclear whether this is strategy or consequence. He is suspicious of clarity either way.