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Matt Haffner’s Aberrant Gods at Whitespace Gallery
May 6, 2016
Burnaway.org
By Jacquelyn O’Callaghan
Matt Haffner’s human subjects exist along the fringes of society, within virtually dystopian urban playgrounds. In Haffner’s solo show at Whitespace Gallery [closing on May 9], titled “The Old Gods and Their Crumbling City,” they are gods, though a peculiar type of god: they are bums and outcasts, blue collar and low-wage workers; they are the inconspicuous bodies and abject creatures of urban life that prowl dimly lit parking lots, scavenge dumpsters, wait at the bus stop, or play chess on a park bench. Haffner mythologizes these persons of the shadows in silhouettes and stencil portraits (techniques—and subject matter—that attest to the artist’s street art background and interest in film noir). Read More.
Matt Haffner Interview
June 10, 2012
Artistviewnet
By Marc Brotherton
How long have you been in Atlanta? What brought you here?
I moved to Atlanta in ’99 to be close to my son who was 9 at the time. I finished grad school a year earlier and Laura my wife was just finishing up. We then packed up and moved here with out jobs, knowing anyone or having any connections. For me though it was a much higher priority than moving to New York for a possible art career; Family always needs to come first. Read More.
KSU’s Matt Haffner awarded NEA grant; SCAD’s Marcia Cohen completes colorful Roman residency
May 8, 2012
ArtsAtl.com
By Chelsey Willis
Savannah College of Art and Design professor Marcia Cohen spent the month of April in a residency at the American Academy in Rome, which SCAD has endowed. Cohen was the first visual artist to receive this fellowship. While in Rome, she continued a long career of color research, studying the palette of the Roman cityscape and the colors of antiquity. Read More.
Matt Haffner’s got street cred
Artist’s solo show celebrates the seamy side of Atlanta life
September 20, 2011
Creative Loafing
by Felicia Feaster
In artist Matt Haffner’s work, Atlanta is a rich urban tapestry teeming with interesting people and places. It is the stomping ground of graffiti artists and street ministers and other denizens of the dusty street corner. Haffner’s the guy you need driving taxis from Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport to give visitors a little atmospheric detour on the way to their Buckhead hotel, to let them see Atlanta isn’t reducible to the city of malls and cul-de-sacs it’s often billed as. A former street artist, Haffner is interested in the emotional nature of city life: all of the things that occur as you’re walking the streets and watching the strange, fascinating parade of humanity and the palimpsest of architecture scroll by. Read More.
Artist Matt Haffner moves in directions old and new
May 23, 2009
ArtsAtl.com
by Catherine Fox
Atlanta artist Matt Haffner has taken full advantage of the unemcumbered time afforded by his Loridans grant to push his art forward. And it’s a good thing: Compared to his new video/mixed-media works, the noirish paintings look a bit too familiar and a bit tired. Read More.