Following a degree in Fine Art, Matthew studied Architectural Ornament at City & Guilds of London Art School. A QEST Scholarship then enabled him to travel to Italy and study in stone workshops in Carrara, Florence and Lucca, where he learnt to carve classically figurative marble sculptures and scale up from a maquette, an area in which the Italians are particularly skilled.
In 2008 Matthew was awarded a Winston Churchill Memorial Trust grant to work with Greek sculptor Petros Dellatolas, and in 2011 a Wingate Scholarship award allowed him to spend six weeks living and carving with Inuit sculptors in the Northwest Territories in Canada.
