.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
Matta's artistic career is one of the most fascinating of all times. Born in Chile and trained as an architect, Matta traveled to France in 1935 were he joined the modernist architect Le Corbusier and discovered the work of Marcel Duchamp, while befriending Gordon Onslow Ford and other members of the Surrealist movement. His early European experience led him to abandon his career as an architect and become an artist. His first body of work consisted of numerous drawings in vibrant color crayons that already showed the various elements that would be present in his work throughout his career. They are much like extraordinary landscapes with fantastic vegetation or complex compositions of nudes absorbed by rich color forms. They constitute the first responses to Matta's own investigations about the idea of transformation or perpetual change; the self and its outward projection; as well as the overwhelming presence of the surrounding environment and the cosmos. These ideas were then fully incorporated in the series of Psychological Morphologies executed in the later part of the 30s and variations on the subject continued to be present in his work.
Matta arrived in New York in 1939 and stirred the local art scene with his extraordinary personality, his keen interest in artistic production and ideas, as well as with his explosive compositions in painting. Aside from being a key figure of the Surrealist community in America, he became, along with Marx Ernst and others, one of the seminal figures that inspired the Abstract Expressionists into finding their own language. The new continent thus became a fertile ground for artistic experimentation, and Matta's work became more aware of the new surroundings altogether. His paintings suggested a strong presence of landscape and his interest in native cultures was stirred, resulting in a deep appreciation for Meso-American art and culture that slowly seeped into his paintings. Some of the pictorial elements present by 1946 that can be traced to his interest and state of awe with the new continent are: the reintroduction of geometric shapes and sharp lines; the renewed presence of the figure as an archetype of the human condition; and other pictorial devices, such as transparencies, to depict a state of perpetual transformation.
Matta's inquisitive mind led him to work closely with Duchamp and his ideas while looking at esoteric divination and other mystical practices such as the tarot and the paranormal. Although the latter did not have such a clearly defined presence in his work, they fed the intellectual interests of the artist about the subconscious and the fate of mankind. Likewise they allowed a brief escape from the devastating war years and other misfortunes. From 1944 onward Matta's paintings contained a more pronounced sense of architectural space that has been identified to suggest "the womb as well as the organic and vast nature of the universe [where] references to specific human conditions and social constructs also abound." (1) In response to Matta's concern with the social issues inherent to modern society and new technology, his paintings represent flux through the use of lines and forms and the mechanization of humankind and its inner struggle through totemic figures of sculptural presence. The Ecclectrician reflects the artist's interest in primitive ritual, depicted by the imposing figure, and Matta's commentary on the dehumanizing effects of modern technology. The existential drama is depicted in this painting by an imposing figure seemingly presiding over an assembly -suggested by its "hands-on" posture-- while inhabiting a complex architectural structure in constant flux.
Matta executed several works commenting on man's place in the world including The Ecclectrician and A Grave Situation, 1946 (Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago). Beyond the Psychological Morphologies series, the works executed between 1944-1946 represent the culmination in painting of Matta's existential concerns of modern man in today's world, and the role of art as an act that requires an act of consciousness on the part of the viewer for its full understanding. (2 ) Today, Matta is considered one of the most committed artists to the dimensions of human existence and its social condition. His emphasis on the political as well as the inner self has differentiated him from all his contemporaries and characterized him as the emblematic figure of the cosmic vision of mankind.
1. E., Smith and C. Darnall. Matta in America: Paintings and Drawings of the 40s, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, 2001, pg. 22.
2. Ibid., pg. 24
Matta arrived in New York in 1939 and stirred the local art scene with his extraordinary personality, his keen interest in artistic production and ideas, as well as with his explosive compositions in painting. Aside from being a key figure of the Surrealist community in America, he became, along with Marx Ernst and others, one of the seminal figures that inspired the Abstract Expressionists into finding their own language. The new continent thus became a fertile ground for artistic experimentation, and Matta's work became more aware of the new surroundings altogether. His paintings suggested a strong presence of landscape and his interest in native cultures was stirred, resulting in a deep appreciation for Meso-American art and culture that slowly seeped into his paintings. Some of the pictorial elements present by 1946 that can be traced to his interest and state of awe with the new continent are: the reintroduction of geometric shapes and sharp lines; the renewed presence of the figure as an archetype of the human condition; and other pictorial devices, such as transparencies, to depict a state of perpetual transformation.
Matta's inquisitive mind led him to work closely with Duchamp and his ideas while looking at esoteric divination and other mystical practices such as the tarot and the paranormal. Although the latter did not have such a clearly defined presence in his work, they fed the intellectual interests of the artist about the subconscious and the fate of mankind. Likewise they allowed a brief escape from the devastating war years and other misfortunes. From 1944 onward Matta's paintings contained a more pronounced sense of architectural space that has been identified to suggest "the womb as well as the organic and vast nature of the universe [where] references to specific human conditions and social constructs also abound." (1) In response to Matta's concern with the social issues inherent to modern society and new technology, his paintings represent flux through the use of lines and forms and the mechanization of humankind and its inner struggle through totemic figures of sculptural presence. The Ecclectrician reflects the artist's interest in primitive ritual, depicted by the imposing figure, and Matta's commentary on the dehumanizing effects of modern technology. The existential drama is depicted in this painting by an imposing figure seemingly presiding over an assembly -suggested by its "hands-on" posture-- while inhabiting a complex architectural structure in constant flux.
Matta executed several works commenting on man's place in the world including The Ecclectrician and A Grave Situation, 1946 (Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago). Beyond the Psychological Morphologies series, the works executed between 1944-1946 represent the culmination in painting of Matta's existential concerns of modern man in today's world, and the role of art as an act that requires an act of consciousness on the part of the viewer for its full understanding. (2 ) Today, Matta is considered one of the most committed artists to the dimensions of human existence and its social condition. His emphasis on the political as well as the inner self has differentiated him from all his contemporaries and characterized him as the emblematic figure of the cosmic vision of mankind.
1. E., Smith and C. Darnall. Matta in America: Paintings and Drawings of the 40s, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, 2001, pg. 22.
2. Ibid., pg. 24