matthew imuetiyan eguavoen (b. 1988, edo state, nigeria) is a lagos-based painter working primarily in oil, acrylic, charcoal, and graphite. his practice sits at the intersection of mental health, depression, and migration — concerns rooted in personal experience and sharpened by the lived realities of african communities navigating societies where these conversations remain largely taboo. through figurative and portrait painting, eguavoen gives visual form to the emotional interior of his subjects: vulnerability, silence, and the weight of unacknowledged suffering.

eguavoen arrived at dot.ateliers as the next chapter in a sustained research trajectory — one that has taken him across west africa documenting the silent, often unacknowledged weight of depression within communities where mental health remains taboo. accra offered a new site for this inquiry, allowing him to engage local communities, document personal narratives, and deepen his exploration of mental health, migration, and belonging within ghanaian and broader west african contexts.

central to his time at dot.ateliers was a workshop he led with young people in the south labadi community — opening space for the very conversations his practice exists to facilitate. in a context where mental health remains under-discussed and under-resourced, the workshop extended his work beyond the studio into direct, lived exchange. his dot.mat artist conversation offered a parallel register: a public intellectual space where the ideas underpinning his practice met open dialogue. people were at the core of his time in accra — the relationships built, the dialogues opened, and the moments of genuine vulnerability that gave his residency its particular depth.