Biography
Matthew Willie Garcia is an American printmaker born in 1985 in California and currently based in Kansas City, Missouri, whose practice extends mokuhanga into the realms of projection-mapped animation, large-scale installation, and what he calls "4D Printmaking." His work explores ideas of queer quantum mechanics, intersectional existence, and speculative science-fiction identity narratives through color abstraction, making him one of the most conceptually adventurous artists working in the contemporary mokuhanga field.
Garcia earned his BFA in Printmaking from the Kansas City Art Institute and his MFA from the University of Kansas. He has traveled to Japan to participate in MI-Lab, the Mokuhanga Innovation Laboratory, deepening his understanding of traditional Japanese woodblock printing techniques while developing a practice that pushes those traditions in radically new directions. His approach to mokuhanga embraces the medium's material qualities -- the transparency of water-based pigments, the registration of multiple blocks, the tactile quality of washi paper -- while deploying them in service of abstract compositions that suggest cosmic space, quantum phenomena, and dimensional fluidity.
His major series include "Venting Space-Time," which explores the visual metaphors of scientific theory through layered color fields, and "We Are Space-Time" and "We Hold Space and Time Within Us," which propose a queer reading of physics and cosmology through printmaking. The series "Embracing the Void" confronts absence and presence through abstract mokuhanga compositions. His work has been included in significant exhibitions including "Queer Abstraction" at the Nerman Contemporary Museum of Art, "Star Children" at the Bradbury Art Museum, and a commissioned print for the Des Moines Art Center (2022).
Garcia serves as Communications Chair for the International Mokuhanga Association (2025-2027) and is a contributor to the Mokuhanga Magic Mokublad publication. He participated in the International Mokuhanga Conference in Nara (2021) and has been featured on The Unfinished Print podcast discussing his concept of "future nostalgia" in mokuhanga practice.
Key Facts
- Active Period
- 1985
- Nationality
- 🇺🇸United States
- Movement
- Contemporary Mokuhanga
- Works Indexed
- 2
Frequently Asked Questions
Matthew Willie Garcia is an American printmaker born in 1985 in California and currently based in Kansas City, Missouri, whose practice extends mokuhanga into the realms of projection-mapped animation, large-scale installation, and what he calls "4D Printmaking." His work explores ideas of queer quantum mechanics, intersectional existence, and speculative science-fiction identity narratives through color abstraction, making him one of the most conceptually adventurous artists working in the contemporary mokuhanga field.
Matthew Willie Garcia was active born in 1985. They were associated with the Contemporary Mokuhanga movement.
Matthew Willie Garcia's work was shaped by the Contemporary Mokuhanga tradition in Japanese woodblock printmaking. Contemporary Mokuhanga: Contemporary mokuhanga (literally "wood-block print") encompasses artists working from approximately 1970 to the present who continue or reinvent traditional Japanese woodblock printing techniques.
Matthew Willie Garcia's prints frequently feature abstract, washi.
Matthew Willie Garcia is a contemporary printmaker whose work has been acquired by museum collections, confirming institutional recognition. Museum representation supports collector confidence. Prices range from $200 for smaller works to $5,000 for major compositions. Most prints sell in the $500–$2,000 range. Museum-collected contemporary printmakers represent a strong value proposition, as institutional validation often precedes market appreciation.
