Matt Guidry
2025-26 Company Guest Artist
He/Him
Matt Guidry made the cultural switch from Texas to Minnesota to pursue his MFA in acting at the University of Minnesota. He has been working professionally as an actor, dancer, choreographer, writer, and educator in Minneapolis since 1992. He is the Co-Founder/Artistic Director of Upstream Arts, using creativity, play, and the language of artistic practices to revolutionize life-long Social and Emotion Learning for individuals with disabilities of all ages, and to infuse an Attitude of Access into organizational cultures throughout the Minneapolis/St. Paul metro and beyond.
In the Twin Cities theatre scene, Matt is a Co-Founder/Co-Artistic Director of The Burning House Group Theater Company, a former member of the Acting Core of Ten Thousand Things Theatre Company, and a former member of the Margolis Brown Adaptors Company. He performance career has included work with The Guthrie Theatre, Pillsbury House + Theatre, Wonderlust, Frank Theatre, and Park Square, among others.
In 2019, as a recipient of the MN State Arts Board Artist Initiative Grant, Matt created and performed the live memoir, The Edge Between, about raising his son Caleb, and about perception in our neuro-diverse world. Matt’s film credits include The Straight Story (David Lynch) and World and Time Enough (winner Audience Award, San Francisco Gay/Lesbian Film Festival).
Guest Artist Statement: Body As Voice: How Embodied Confidence Informs Your World
Matt’s work over the past two decades with Upstream Arts has been about practicing how to connect and relate, in small moments, through multi-disciplinary creative interactions and improvisations. Through an exploration of expression, engagement, and conversation, with a sense of curiosity and radical listening, we discover and name who it is that we are, and express our uniqueness beyond the categories we may have been put under, beyond any seeming deficits, and beyond the naming of our abilities or disabilities. We are all more than one story. To understand ourselves, our strengths, our fractures, is a pathway to be our full and confident selves, build healthy relationships, and engage in community life
Photo by Jason Bucklin