Prolific muralist Matteo Miles highlights Upstate culture and communities
Vintage travel posters and detailed Día de los Muertos looks. Charming pet portraits and 80 vibes in electrifying neon hues. Vibrant and versatile, the diverse work of Upstate-based muralist Matteo Miles is a patchwork portrait of the artist’s fascinating journey to present day.
“I’ve been drawing for as long as I can remember,” reflects Miles, who admits that while he pursued an art degree, his curiosity prevented him from sticking with it. “I went into bartending, tattooing, taxidermy . . . I even worked at a funeral home for a few years.”
After nearly a decade of exploration, his passion for art brought Miles back to the studio, where the Southern California native has made it a rewarding full-time career—and made Greenville home.
“I started out doing chalk art at local hotels, specifically the Aloft Hotel,” says Miles, who credits his premiere at Artisphere as the pivotal moment that launched him from studio to street. “From there I started branching off into more permanent pieces for other local restaurants and bars, hotels, and residences. I like to have fun with my murals and put a vibrant touch in my artwork—it has a lot of character.”
While Miles has since traveled as far as Hawaii to paint murals, he has found camaraderie in his home base of the Upstate. “Painting murals has helped me get to know the Greenville arts community a lot better. It’s very expansive, and there are a lot of studio artists here, but [not as much] public art. I’ve gotten to know some other muralists really well, and we’re working together to build more of a foundation for public art to grow here.”
Placemaking Murals
One specialty of this artist is placemaking murals, where he researches the history of a town and draws on vintage travel advertisements to infuse new life into iconic portraits of a community. “I’ve worked with Fountain Inn, Simpsonville, and Mauldin this past year to [create murals that help] trademark the best parts of a city through public art,” says Miles, who has enjoyed seeing residents and the local media react to the new murals.
If any creative embraces the idea of “Dream Big,” it’s Miles—after all, that’s the title of his largest mural to date. “My next challenge is definitely to go bigger and grow farther with my murals,” reveals the painter. “When I saw the BB&T mural by Australian artist Guido van Helten go up in 2020, seeing that magnitude, I said, ‘Wow—that’s what I want to do. I want to work up to that scale.’ I think [the van Helten mural] is something that we want to see more of in Greenville as our city gets bigger, and I want our community to know that we have the hands here to do it.”
Until that skyscraper comes calling, Miles continues to work on stunning new murals throughout Greenville—and occasionally, trading city walls for the four walls of his home studio.
“I would like to do more studio art in the future,” he says. “For instance, I recently participated in the Metropolitan Arts Council’s Flat Out Under Pressure contest, which [was a way] of getting my foot in the door with more gallery work. It was such a fun challenge,” says Miles, who won a prize in the fast-paced competition.
Top 3 Styles and Subjects from Matteo Miles
- Art Deco
- Surrealism
- Pop Culture
For mural updates: @matteomilesmurals on Instagram; for fine art news: www.matteom.com
