I make paintings, drawings and objects that slyly address the trajectory of our cultural norms. Through illusion, formalism, and material I reframe perception to broadly reflect on the devolution of the middle-class and amend perceptions of the American Dream; an illusion of wealth and/or opportunity. Capitalism fuels greed; Scams, pyramid, and get-rich-quick schemes are rampant in an economy wherein the mark of success is accumulation. Growing up in Los Angeles, the entertainment capital of the world, makes these dynamics more difficult to recognize at face value as simulacrum is everywhere in plain sight. From almost anywhere I roamed in LA, the skyline was shared by both the Griffith Park Observatory and the Hollywood Sign. Both pinnacle icons for show-biz, yet ironically one deals in science and the other in fabrication. Existing for different objectives, they both rely on optics and perception. Borrowing from both high and low culture, sometimes innocuously, even humorously, my work forms dialogues about where our perspectives, practices, and values are shifting.
From Memento Mori paintings to animal carcass readymade sculptures, art holds a mirror to the mortality of nature. Yet humans are different; language, capitalism, and society distance us from the process of death. These systems distort our connection to the natural world; these systems are the artifice of life—trompe l'oeil.My work explores perception, nature, grief, and technology through vehicles of imitation, scale, craft, and the ephemeral. The co-opting of language and symbols indicates cultural paradigm shifts. We stream video content into our living rooms, drink bottled water branded with images of mountain springs, and store our most priceless memories in the cloud. Amazon is now more commonly referenced as an online shopping platform than as one of the planet’s richest natural resources, constantly on the verge of destruction. We are at a crossroads between fragile ecosystems of nature and artifice, consumption and class, labor and depreciation, language and impotence. These frictions sit at the center of my work, forming a dialogue about shifting perspectives, practices, and values.
Anthropology, ecology, economics, semiotics, philosophy, and history weave through my work. These fields emerge through the application of everyday objects and their transformation through various materials and processes. I borrow from both high and low culture to form a dialogue about how reality is mediated in contemporary culture and how craft is redefined. It is a slow digestion where surface, imitation, process, and perception are examined to reflect on our current cultural climate.
© Daina Mattis 2026
© Daina Mattis 2026
