Matt Copson
°1992, London, UK
Works and lives in London.
Artist and director Matt Copson’s practice is hybrid in its essence. He uses opera, animation, installation, and performance to create often immersive works and worlds that fuse mainstream culture, ancient myth, and philosophical inquiry. Exploring existential questions and analysing our contemporary subjectivity – defined by flux, spectacle, dopamine hits, and the attention economy – his oeuvre is hallmarked by an idiosyncratic blend of cynicism and tragicomic humour.
Through laser-projected drawings, light, and sound, Copson constructs operatic environments where characters grapple with mortality, vanity, and the absurdity of human existence. In his acclaimed trilogy Coming of Age (2020-2021), a laser-animated baby embodies the cycles of birth, desire, and self-destruction. These works mark the foundation of a broader cosmology in Copson’s oeuvre, later expanded in Last Days (2023), an opera premiered at London’s Royal Opera House, composed by Oliver Leith and adapted from Gus Van Sant’s film of the same name, a fictionalised account of the last days of Kurt Cobain.
Rooted in a fascination with mortality, Copson’s work turns death into a site of renewal, coupling apocalyptic imagery with a paradoxical optimism. His theatrical approach to installation – treating the gallery as a stage – invites viewers into spaces where the absurd and the sacred coexist. In 2025, Copson presented his first institutional solo exhibition, Coming of Age. Age of Coming. Of Coming Age, at KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin.
