a socially-engaged artist, strategist, and learnerUtah and New York-based
working at the intersection of ecological systems
and public engagement
Through exhibitions, workshops, and participatory projects, Mattie creates moments of connection
that ground us in our relationality
to each other
and the earth.
She has taught design at the University of Utah
and facilitated communal felting workshops
that explore multispecies practices
and slow material processes.
Currently completing her MFA in Transdisciplinary Design
at The New School, Mattie's thesis investigates
the systems and rituals
that bring people into embodied experiences
with living systems
—soil, water, wool,
and the labor that sustains them.
Her practice bridges rural and urban contexts,
seeking to make visible
the entanglements
between land, labor, and community care
working at the intersection of ecological systems and public engagement
Through exhibitions, workshops, and participatory projects, Mattie creates moments of connection that ground us in our relationality to each other and the earth. She has taught design at the University of Utah and facilitated communal felting workshops that explore multispecies practices and slow material processes.
Currently completing her MFA in Transdisciplinary Design at The New School, Mattie's thesis investigates the systems and rituals that bring people into embodied experiences with living systems —soil, water, wool, and the labor that sustains them. Her practice bridges rural and urban contexts, seeking to make visible the entanglements between land, labor, and community care
If you have made it this far in your wander through the site, I applaud you, and in exchange for your sustained engagement with the pieces that make up my practice, let me tell you a little about what I am currently thinking about:
✶Deep material engagement, how do I continue sitting with something and learning from it when I feel its "functionality" has faded? I think as I live in a room filled with thousands of oyster shells from a past project, and pounds of wool from the current one.
✶Having a spiritual "community of practice" is more about finding those who are willing to think deeply about the potentials of spiritual connection than finding those who agree with me.
✶When using aesthetics to tell a story, the layering of sensory experience is just as important as the qualitative research. Journey mapping with my undergrads has made me realize that often no observation happens past how many people go in an out of a door.