SELECTED PRESS:
LISS FAIN DANCE
Her longtime collaborator, Matthew Antaky, envelops her filigreed choreography with masterful lighting and scenic designs. Rarely has Yerba Buena Center for the Arts' stage looked as good…
- SF Chronicle
Ms. Fain has always worked with ballet trained dancers and good collaborators, above all, the excellent scenic and lighting wizard, Matthew Antaky.
- SF Bay Guardian
TACIT CONSENT
A dazzling installation by the wonderful Matthew Antaky that consists of four adjoining rooms, separated by walls made of hundreds of manila envelopes (660, to be exact), which become projection surface. No matter where the viewer wanders, it is often possible to see what’s happening in more than one room at a time. Mr. Antaky has also added some live video projections from one area into an adjacent one to reinforce the obvious implications of surveillance and one’s consent to being recorded in public spaces. - SF Chronicle
A SPACE DIVIDED
The installation was created by the prolific and popular designer, Matthew Antaky. Entering what seems like the façade of a house made of metal frames and stretched strips of cellophane, offering two doorways to choose from. Once inside a glistening wall of metal-and-cellophane runs lengthwise and bisects the space with three passageways onto four separate dance spaces. You are encouraged to walk around during the 45 min performance. The structure is intended to represent the two hemispheres of the brain and the crossover that occurs between them. The semi-transparent wall that separates the spaces evokes perfectly the feeling of a membrane through which almost anything seems possible. - SF Bay Guardian
THE IMPERFECT IS OUR PARADISE
Imperfect communicates with its intelligence, clarity of purpose, and rich, tight choreography. Mr. Antaky added his installation magic, as usual, by designing 12 panels that hung high above the audience on all four sides. They first suggested a sense of enclosure with brick walls, then threats from nature, stockade-like fences, and finally a dead house on a hill. The stage floor looked like dry dirt, or at other times as if covered with leaves. It beautifully elicited the disappearance of the genteel south. - SF Chronicle
AFTER THE LIGHT
At Z Space Theater, scenic and lighting designer Matthew Antaky once more worked his magic with Liss Fain Dance for Fain's new, intensely private After the Light. More than a dance performance, "After the Light" is an immersive theatrical experience. Designed to evoke the feeling of a medieval cloister with a walkway surrounding a central courtyard, Mr. Antaky's installation consists of a series of elegant arches through which the audience is encouraged to wander. - SF Bay Guardian
THE WATER IS CLEAR AND STILL
The main center of interest is the outstanding production and lighting design by Matthew Antaky, whose contribution to Bay Area dance has never been adequately celebrated. For Fain, Mr. Antaky has fashioned an immersive environment ringed by nine metallic trees with sprouting branches and multilevel bases. They form a stylish, futuristic forest through which the dancers flow and slide. - SF Chronicle
THE FALSE AND TRUE ARE ONE
Matthew Antaky's large transparent fiberglass panels made for muted perspectives on the four squares within the bigger square that the dancers inhabited. The simple austere design looked a little like a board game and the gallery like effect was airy enough to allow for a number of pathways for the dancers. - SF Bay Guardian
OPERA PARALLELE
LIGHTHOUSE
…once again, with a sure hand Mr Antaky’s lighting wonderfully evoked the creepy and abandoned world of the Scottish coast lighthouse and the ghosts that haunted it …. - SF Classical Voice
DEAD MAN WALKING
…the superb lighting by Matthew Antaky delved into the dark shadows and conflict of the main character and helped bring the whole production into focus. - The Opera Tattler
HEART OF DARKNESS
Along with the vivid projections, the subtle and exacting lighting balanced the opera to perfection. - SF Classical Voice
MAHOGONY SONGSPIEL AND LES MAMELLE
Mr. Antaky’s colorful and spectacular lighting made the wild romp through this hybrid opera production magical. - SF Examiner
AINADAMAR
...the production team headed by stage director Brian Staufenbiel well deserves acknowledgment, especially Matthew Antaky’s scenic and lighting design (kudos on both accounts). A two-tiered set with an open mesh second floor lit with rich vibrant tones captured the exact spirit of the music. - SF Chronicle
Considerable forces have been assembled by Opera Parallèle, a company that's increasingly significant on the Bay Area scene -- unparalleled in its staging of contemporary works. The technical and creative wizardry of Matthew Antaky as scenic and lighting designer is impressive. - The Opera Tattler
GREAT GATSBY
The substantial and straightforward sets by scenic designer Matthew Antaky were a pleasant mix of realism and modernism that reflected the nature of the opera perfectly.....…Matthew Antaky’s wonderful sets and beautiful lighting used a few deft strokes to conjure up Gatsby’s mansion, a Manhattan hotel suite, and poor George Wilson’s dusty auto garage. - SF Chronicle
FOUR SAINTS IN THREE ACTS
…the absurdity of the opera was greatly supported by the stunningly imaginative and playful set designs by Matthew Antaky who also created the lovely lighting for the whole evening. - The Opera Tattler
WOZZECK
Ensemble Parallèle's cinematic-style staging made elaborate use of live, large-scale video projections to highlight the action. Matthew Antaky’s simple and elegant designs bolstered the action by moving and rotating two large units into various positions to create the multiple locations needed. The show brought grand opera and theatre together beautifully. - SF Chronicle
ODC DANCE
GIANT
The simple moving background configurations of the YBCA curtains along with three white stripes on the floor gave an impressive architecture to the stage… and the lighting was subtle and sumptuous… - SF Chronicle
DEAD RECKONING
Starting out stark, rhythmic and disturbing the piece evolved and soon gave way to a wild flurry of confetti that created a storm of paper that didn’t seem to end until the final crash of the tree. - SF Chronicle
EUCLID
The stage and lighting designed by Matthew Antaky supported the piece quite well.
Whether catching a spinning solo in a square of white light or by the large white square that hung at the back of the stage and resembled what seemed like a relief map. - Dance Magazine
GRASSLANDS
Scenic and Lighting designer Matthew Antaky bathes the stage in grassy tones of chartreuse and gold and his soft, gauzy curtain and cluster of wires and rods that dangle at oblique angles becomes a sculptural field against which all the prances and shivers stand out in focused relief. - SF Chronicle
FLYAWAY PRODUCTIONS
GRACE AND DELIA ARE GONE
Flyaway Productions's 25th anniversary year finds them at the old firehouse at Fort Mason Center and although on a smaller and more intimate scale then previous productions, the usual team of designers, including Mr. Antaky creating the imaginative and appropriate lighting, bring the haunting ballads and stories to life. - SF Bay Guardian
NEEDLES TO THREADS
Down a back alley in the Tenderloin, Flyaway Productions gives us their latest feast in three different areas and on various levels, all of which are lit with a canny variety of sources from Matthew Antaky that capture all the moments of choreography perfectly…- SF Chronicle
MULTIPLE MARY AND INVISIBLE JANE
Matthew Antaky’s expert lighting both illuminates the performers brilliantly and conjures some wild and fascinating shadows on the immense wall they are performing on. - SF Bay Guardian