Born in Preston, Lancashire, UK, in 1978.
Lives in North Yorkshire.
When Matthew Dever was young he was interested in drawing and painting, encouraged by his grandfather and uncle, a professional artist living and working in Manchester during the 80s.
In 1990, Matthew, his parents, grandparents, two brothers and an uncle drove to Poland in a minibus to retrace their past; Matthew was charged with documenting the event on an 8mm format Sony. The exact whereabouts of their relatives laid mostly unknown, so they drove across Europe and worked it out along the way. Matthew was able to document rural life, a family affected by Chernobyl fallout and a protest outside the Russian Embassy in Krakow. The footage ran to a three-hour film.
As part of Matthew Dever's degree studies, in 2001, he read sociology and social policy and he now uses a sociological perspective to research influence on beliefs and behaviours.
