Matt Caines studied Architectural Ornament at City & Guilds School of Art, London, following a first degree in Fine Art. Work includes designing & carving a plaque in beech, unveiled by H.R.H The Prince of Wales; workshops at the Museum of London based on Roman artifacts and at the Sir John Soane Museum; and the restoration of Sam Wanamaker’s stone at the Globe Theatre.
‘…I love the history, tradition and craft of stone masonry and went to work in Carrara in Tuscany once I graduated. The Materials I use are slow, they ground you, they are timeless. When I carve marble, I am following in the footsteps of the ancient Greeks, when I carve Portland stone I feel the tradition of the Portland quarry workers who built St Paul’s.’
Matt spent six weeks on a Wingate Scholarship working at the studio of the Ashoona family in Yellowknife Northern Canada to learn about Inuit sculpture and its materials. Whilst there he carved Polar Bears, Walrus and Caribou in Arctic stones as well as shamans and drum dancers in shed antler and worked on a large found whalebone carving with Goota Ashoona, one of the Arctic’s finest artists. Matt also worked on engraving bone, or ‘scrimshaw’, a legacy from whaling crews who made images on pieces of bone on their long voyages.