Matt Lively Opening (Red Door Gallery)

Last weekend, I attended Matt Lively's opening at the Red Door Gallery for his series of new work, "Home." I was familiar with Matt's work since last year, when he was my Surface Research teacher in Art Foundations. However, I had never seen it before in a gallery setting. His paintings were very well presented by the Red Door Gallery, which is much smaller than I expected, having never been there. You would think large-scale paintings in a small-scale space would maybe be claustrophobic, however, the presentation in my opinion was very easy to view.
It was also nice to view the work on the opening night because it gives it a friendlier atmosphere, especially because I was familiar with his previous work and style anyway. However, had it been an unknown artist, I would probably not have enjoyed the experience of a crowded gallery on opening night.
In addition to Matt's paintings, he is working on a short film, called The Windchill Factory, in which he is building a group of small glass globes surrounding houses. These constructions where also on display and pleasantly offset his paintings, (many of which feature the same style house.)
It was great to see an artist/past teacher/friend's work in a gallery setting. To me, it made the experience of going to a new gallery space much more familiar than it would have been otherwise.