Chloe Dewe Mathews

Chloe Dewe Mathews (born 1982)^[1] is a British documentary photographer,^[2] based in St Leonards-on-Sea, UK. She is "best known for ambitious documentary projects that can take years of preparation."^[2] Dewe Mathews has said "I am exploring ways in which to project the past on to the present".^[3]

Her series Shot at Dawn records sites where British, French and Belgian soldiers were executed for cowardice or desertion during the first world war. It was published as a book in 2014 and exhibited at Tate Modern and at the Irish Museum of Modern Art. In Search of Frankenstein was exhibited at the British Library in 2018.

Dewe Mathews' work is held in the collections of the British Council, Herbert Art Gallery and Museum and Sheffield Galleries and Museums Trust.

Life and work

Dewe Mathews was born in 1982 in London.^[1] She studied fine art at the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art, Oxford.^[1]

For her series Caspian, she walked around the Caspian Sea, through Azerbaijan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Russia, and Turkmenistan.^[1][2]

Her series Shot at Dawn records many of the sites across France and Belgium where around 1000 British, French and Belgian soldiers were executed for cowardice or desertion during the first world war.^[2][4] She photographed each site at dawn, the time that most of the men were executed; close to the date on which they occurred; and from around the same vantage that they were shot.^[4] It was commissioned by the Ruskin School of Art at the University of Oxford as part of a commemorative art series,^[4][5] published as a book in 2014 and exhibited in various places.

Dewe Mathews completed an artist's residency at the Verbier 3-D Foundation, Bagnes, Switzerland in 2016 on the topic of the so-called Year Without a Summer, a period of severe climate deterioration.^[3][6] This provided the backdrop for Mary Shelley when writing Frankenstein (1818) whilst staying in the same area. Dewe Mathews' series made there, In Search of Frankenstein, is concerned with contemporary environmental and social issues via the themes of Shelley's novel.^[7]

She spent five years making Thames Log, a series about the variety of peoples' relationship with the River Thames.^[2][8][9]

Publications

Publications by Dewe Mathews

• Shot at Dawn. Madrid: Ivorypress, 2014. ISBN 9788494146275. With texts by Geoff Dyer, Hew Strachan, Helen McCarthy and Paul Bonaventura.
• Sunday Service. Tate Modern and You. London: Tate, 2014. With texts by Synthia Griffin and Phil Stokes.
• In Search of Frankenstein – Mary Shelley's Nightmare. Baden, Switzerland: Kodoji, 2018. ISBN 9783037470916. Dewe Mathews' photographs with reproductions of The Geneva Notebook, the first half of Mary Shelley's original manuscript for Frankenstein.
• Caspian: The Elements. New York City: Aperture; Cambridge, MA: Peabody Museum Press, 2018. ISBN 978-1-59711-444-8. With essays by Morad Montazami, Sean O'Hagan and Arnold van Bruggen.
• Thames Log. London: Loose Joints; Bristol: Martin Parr Foundation, 2021. ISBN 978-1-912719-19-8. With a text by Marina Warner.^{[10][11][12][13]}

Publications with contributions by Dewe Mathews

• Conflict: Time: Photography. London: Tate, 2014. ISBN 978-1-84976-320-2. Edited by Simon Baker and Shoair Mavlian. Exhibition Catalogue.

Exhibitions

Solo exhibitions

• Sunday Service, Tate Modern, London, 2014.^[14]
• Shot at Dawn, Stills, Edinburgh, 2014;^[15] Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, 2015–2016;^[16] Ivorypress, Madrid, 2016.^[17]
• Congregation, Bosse & Baum, London, 2015.^[18]
• In Search of Frankenstein, British Library, London, 2018.^[3][7]

Significant group exhibitions

• Conflict, Time, Photography, Tate Modern, London, 2014–2015. Included Shot at Dawn.^[4][19][20]

Awards

• 2011: British Journal of Photography International Photography Award^[21]
• 2014: Robert Gardner Fellow in Photography at the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University^[22]
• 2016: Vic Odden Award, Royal Photographic Society, Bath, UK^[23]

Collections

Dewe Mathews' work is held in the following permanent public collections:

• British Council Collection: 4 prints from Shot at Dawn (as of 25 April 2018)^[24]
• Herbert Art Gallery and Museum (acquired with assistance from Art Fund): 2 prints from Shot at Dawn (as of 25 April 2018)^[25]
• Graves Art Gallery, Sheffield Galleries and Museums Trust (acquired with assistance from the Contemporary Art Society): 3 prints from Shot at Dawn (as of 25 April 2018)^[26]

References

1. Malone, Theresa (12 June 2013). "Chloe Dewe Mathews's best photograph – Uzbek migrant workers". The Guardian. Retrieved 25 April 2018.
2. O'Hagan, Sean (18 September 2016). "Chloe Dewe Mathews: 'People see the river as an antidote to the city'". The Guardian. Retrieved 24 April 2018.
3. O'Hagan, Sean (12 April 2018). "Frozen with fear: a photographic journey into the icy landscape of Frankenstein". The Guardian. Retrieved 25 April 2018.
4. O'Hagan, Sean (29 June 2014). "Chloe Dewe Mathews's Shot at Dawn: a moving photographic memorial". The Guardian. Retrieved 24 April 2018.
5. "The Ruskin School of Art - Chloe Dewe Mathews Shot At Dawn". www.rsa.ox.ac.uk. Retrieved 25 April 2018.
6. "Chloe Dewe Mathews goes In Search of Frankenstein in the Swiss Alps – British Journal of Photography". www.bjp-online.com. Retrieved 25 April 2018.
7. "In Search of Frankenstein: Photographs by Chloe Dewe Mathews". The British Library. Retrieved 25 April 2018.
8. "Chloe Dewe Mathews looks beyond the popular portrayals of the River Thames". www.itsnicethat.com. Retrieved 13 February 2021.
9. Fulleylove, Rebecca (19 January 2021). "Chloe Dewe Mathews on her five-year project capturing the River Thames". Creative Review. Retrieved 13 February 2021.
10. "Mud, Sludge and Mysticism: A Photographic Tribute to the River Thames". AnOther. 13 January 2021. Retrieved 13 February 2021.
11. Allnutt, Chris (2 January 2021). "Snapshot: 'Thames Log' by Chloe Dewe Mathews". Financial Times. Retrieved 13 February 2021.
12. Smythe, Diane (28 January 2021). "Life along the River Thames". Apollo. Retrieved 13 February 2021.
13. "Chloe Dewe Mathews discovers a richness of life along the River Thames". British Journal of Photography. Retrieved 13 February 2021.
14. Tate. "Tate Modern and You: Sunday Service – Exhibition at Tate Modern". Tate. Retrieved 25 April 2018.
15. "Shot at Dawn, Chloe Dewe Mathews". www.stills.org. 26 August 2014. Retrieved 25 April 2018.
16. www.damiencarbery.com, Website Designed, Developed and Hosted by Damien Carbery -. "Chloe Dewe Mathews: Shot at Dawn". www.imma.ie. Retrieved 25 April 2018.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
17. "Chloe Dewe Mathews. Shot at Dawn - Ivorypress". Ivorypress. Retrieved 25 April 2018.
18. "Chloe Dewe Mathews: Congregation". www.bosseandbaum.com. Retrieved 25 April 2018.
19. "Points of memory: Chloe Dewe Mathews". www.tate.org.uk. Retrieved 25 April 2018.
20. "Shot at Dawn - haunting and evocative photographs of locations where First World War soldiers were shot for desertion or 'cowardice'". 10 November 2014. ISSN 0307-1235. Retrieved 25 April 2018 – via www.telegraph.co.uk.
21. "The International Photography Award: Past winners – British Journal of Photography". www.bjp-online.com. Retrieved 24 April 2018.
22. "Chloe Dewe Mathews: Gardner Photography Fellow 2014". Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. Accessed 25 April 2018.
23. . Royal Photographic Society. Archived from the original on 21 May 2016. Retrieved 24 April 2018.
24. Council, British. "Chloe Dewe Mathews". visualarts.britishcouncil.org. Retrieved 24 April 2018.
25. Fund, Art. "Shot at Dawn numbers 14 & 22 by Chloe Dewe Mathews". Art Fund. Retrieved 24 April 2018.
26. "Acquisitions & Art Consultancy". Contemporary Art Society. Accessed 25 April 2018.

External links

• Official website
• TateShots: Chloe Dewe Mathews (video)
• Sunday Service photographs at British Journal of Photography