Word: matta
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...group; but in the early 1920s, Breton's writings put forward a new way of looking at life as a whole. Surrealism began as a literary movement, but its tenets led beyond culture--even though, today, it is chiefly manifested in art--towards what the Chilean artist Sebastion Antonio Matta Echaurren maintained to be "the total emancipation of man." For Breton's message was as revolutionary as any of the political tracts of the time...
...ancient monastery of Deir el Makarios in the desert 50 miles southwest of Cairo, a Coptic monk is causing a mild sensation, drawing as many as 500 visitors a day. His name: Matta el Meskin, Matthew the Poor. Like the great anchorite St. Anthony, Matta el Meskin was once an affluent young man-a prosperous pharmacist. At the age of 29, heeding Jesus' call to "sell what you have," he disposed of his two houses, two cars, two pharmacies, gave the proceeds to the poor and, keeping only a cloak, devoted himself to prayer and asceticism...
...same mood are Paul Klee's Collection of Signs. Southerly which illustrate the inventive variety of the ways two lines can be crossed to indicate a direction. Many of the signs bleed their black edges into the watercolor of yellow and orange warmth. Matta, represented here by a large crayon and pencil drawing from 1939, brings into view the biomorphic qualities of his surrealism...
Prophetic Approaches. In the long run, the other technique of "automatist" surrealism proved more revolutionary and durable. As practiced by Joan Miro, André Masson, Max Ernst and Roberto Matta, automatism relied on the unconscious to direct the pen, pencil, brush or tube of glue. "Rather than setting out to paint something," said Miró, "I begin, and as I paint, the picture begins to assert itself." Landscape with Rooster, one of a dozen outsize, uninhibited Mirós on display, illustrates the antic, fanciful contours that result...
Handsome Payoff. Since the present curator, William N. Eisendrath, 64, moved the collection into its zippy new $650,000 Steinberg Hall gallery in 1960, he has added still more modern paintings, including Sam Francis' flamboyant Arcueil and Roberto Matta's perkily prismatic Abstraction (see color opposite). There are also other, more familiar works, such as a Jackson Pollock that was bought in 1953 for $3,000 and is now insured...