Items Similar to Bottom of Summer Oceans, Abstract Surrealist Painting
Want more images or videos?
Request additional images or videos from the seller
1 of 6
Sebastian "Batan" Matta-ClarkBottom of Summer Oceans, Abstract Surrealist Painting1974
1974
About the Item
Sebastian Matta-Clark was born in 1943, twin of Gordon Matta-Clark. Son Of Chilean Surrealist Roberto Matta
Sebastian, known as Batan died in 1976.
He showed 3 exhibitions in his short lifetime, two in Gallerie Lolas in New York, and one in La Galerie du Dragon in Paris. He exhibited posthumously in Paris, a solo exhibit in 2006, at Gallerie Samy Kinge, Paris, and part of a group exhibit in 2013 at the Maison Rouge, Paris.
From a young age, Batan and his twin brother drew and were budding artists, He continued to grow into a great artist with mythic qualities to his work. With Teeny and Marcel Duchamp for godparents, Matta-Clark was exposed from an early age to a wide circle of avant-garde artistic influences.
His half-brother, also an artist, Pablo Echaurren, shared that it's really a shame that his art did not become well known in his lifetime, He should have received the recognition he merited.
John Sebastian Bata Matta-Clark’s New York was a tougher, grittier, more tumultuous place than the stylish television backdrop it often seems today: his father, the Surrealist painter Roberto Echaurren Matta, studied in Chile and worked under Le Corbusier for a time. Matta-Clark's parents were artists: the American painter Anne Clark, and the Chilean surrealist painter Roberto Matta . His twin brother, John Sebastian (called Batan ), was also an artist. His parents had met in Paris, but due to the imminence of World War II, they settled in New York like many other artists of the time, where Gordon and his brother were born.
Born on June 22, 1943, he spent his childhood in West Village, Manhattan, where he attended private schools. His parents separated definitively in 1948 and Matta returned to Europe. From that moment, the contacts between father and son will be intermittent and devoid of familiarity. However, with some frequency Gordon would travel to France and Chile with his brother Batán , where his paternal grandparents resided.
His work influenced the likes of Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning, yet the Latin-American painter remains relatively unknown. Now there are signs that his reputation is slowly on the up.
It’s safe to say that Manhattan gallerist Julien Levy had rather a good eye.
In the 1930s and 1940s, Salvador Dalí, Alberto Giacometti, Frida Kahlo, Joseph Cornell and Henri Cartier-Bresson were among the artists given their first New York shows at his gallery.
Arguably the most important exhibition held there, though, was by a lesser-known painter: Roberto Matta. Matta had made his name as a Surrealist in Paris and, as the Second World War broke out, decided to move to the US. Levy gave him a solo show in 1940 and the impact it had on a generation of new American artists was huge.
Like Miró, Matta championed an automatist form of Surrealism, creating work through the unplanned gestures of his brush, which moved faster than his mind could think.
Matta referred to his paintings as “inscapes”, shorthand for landscapes of the mind, as if he were tapping into the unconscious every time he painted. His practice would influence the likes of Jackson Pollock, Robert Motherwell, Willem de Kooning and Arshile Gorky immensely.
In short, he was a vital bridge between Surrealism and Abstract Expressionism, and any analysis of the shift of artistic power from Paris to New York in the 20th century must surely include Matta.
He isn’t, however, as well-remembered today as he might be. He’s not a household name in the way Dalí, Giacometti and the other artists mentioned so far in this piece are. He’s often even confused with his own son, the sculptor Gordon Matta-Clark.
Why is this? In part, one suspects, because he came to Surrealism late; in 1937, to be precise, some 13 years after the movement had been launched and by which time all its major works had been painted. (Matta trained as an architect and worked for two years in the office of Le Corbusier in Paris).
Though a key influence on the Abstract Expressionists, he was never actually one of their number. His work, broadly speaking, was figurative. Clement Greenberg, the era’s art critic par excellence and Ab Ex painters’ cheerleader-in-chief, derided him as “the prince of comic-strippers” – a moniker that Matta never entirely managed to shake off. In 1948, he returned to Europe.
Another reason Matta fails to be accorded his due is nationality. Born in Santiago, Chile, he moved to Europe only in his twenties and is still often pigeonholed as a Latin-American artist. He has never quite made it into the Western canon; his work still tends to appear in Latin-American (rather than Modern) art sales at auction.
Matta moved back to Chile in 1970, when Salvador Allende’s socialist Popular Unity party won power. He painted a number of public murals in its support – one of which, El Primer Gol del Pueblo Chileno (“The First Goal of the Chilean People”), long thought lost, was recovered in 2008.
It had been deleted with 18 coats of paint during the dictatorial regime of General Augusto Pinochet. (Pinochet seized office from Allende in a coup in 1973 and immediately put Matta’s name on a “hit list”. The artist, fearing that no amount of bodyguards would be enough to protect him, fled the country.)
The Seventies was a particularly bad decade for Matta – personally as well as politically. He lost both his twin sons in their mid-thirties: Sebastian committed suicide in 1976 after a long battle with schizophrenia and Gordon died of pancreatic cancer in 1978.
The former is the subject of For Batan, a painting which forms part of Intesa Sanpaolo’s stellar collection of modern and contemporary art (Batan was Sebastian’s nickname). In truth, it’s hard to make out many direct references in it by Matta to his son: his art was too elusive for such things.
- Creator:Sebastian "Batan" Matta-Clark (1943 - 1976, American)
- Creation Year:1974
- Dimensions:Height: 34.5 in (87.63 cm)Width: 43 in (109.22 cm)
- Medium:
- Movement & Style:
- Period:
- Condition:
- Gallery Location:Surfside, FL
- Reference Number:
About the Seller
4.9
Platinum Seller
These expertly vetted sellers are 1stDibs' most experienced sellers and are rated highest by our customers.
Established in 1995
1stDibs seller since 2014
1,559 sales on 1stDibs
Typical response time: 1 hour
- ShippingRetrieving quote...Ships From: Surfside, FL
- Return PolicyA return for this item may be initiated within 3 days of delivery.
More From This SellerView All
- Surrealist Woman Oil painting French-Moroccan Israeli Bezalel School PainterBy Simon AvissarLocated in Surfside, FLTwo Women. Colorful Surrealist Portrait Genre: Surrealism Subject: woman Medium: Oil Surface: Canvas Country: Israel Simon Avissar, painter, born 1948, Morocco. Moved to U.S.A. Wo...Category
20th Century Surrealist Figurative Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
- Twinning Stars, Abstract Surrealist Oil Painting 1970sLocated in Surfside, FLSebastian Matta-Clark was born in 1943, twin of Gordon Matta-Clark. Son Of Chilean Surrealist Roberto Matta Sebastian, known as Batan died in 1976. He showed 3 exhibitions in his sho...Category
1970s Surrealist Abstract Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
- Italian Surrealist "Butterflies Under the Sea, 1962" PaintingBy Giordano FalzoniLocated in Surfside, FLGenre: Contemporary Subject: Abstract Medium: Oil Surface: Canvas Country: Italy Dimensions: 19 3/4" x 15 1/2" x 3/4" Dimensions w/Frame: 26" x 22" Giordano Falzoni (Italian, 1925-...Category
1960s Surrealist Abstract Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
- Untitled, Nude Surreal Figures Together Slovenian French Oil PaintingBy Heinrich Maryan FramaLocated in Surfside, FLGenre: Surrealism Subject: Abstract Medium: Oil Surface: Canvas Country: France In this surreal composition by Heinrich M. Frama the artist clumps a group of figures towards the mid...Category
20th Century Surrealist Figurative Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
- Indian Summer, Abstract Surrealist Oil Painting 1970sLocated in Surfside, FLSebastian Matta-Clark was born in 1943, twin of Gordon Matta-Clark. Son Of Chilean Surrealist Roberto Matta Sebastian, known as Batan died in 1976. He showed 3 exhibitions in his sho...Category
1970s Surrealist Abstract Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
- Abstract Surrealist 'Double Entry on the Plane' Oil Painting 1970sLocated in Surfside, FLSebastian Matta-Clark was born in 1943, twin of Gordon Matta-Clark. Son Of Chilean Surrealist Roberto Matta Sebastian, known as Batan died in 1976. He showed 3 exhibitions in his sho...Category
1970s Surrealist Abstract Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
You May Also Like
- L'epreuveBy Roberto MattaLocated in Palm Desert, CAA painting by Roberto Matta. "L'epreuve" is a surrealist painting, oil on canvas in palette of grays, greens, and yellows by Latin American artist Roberto Matta. It is signed in the ...Category
Mid-20th Century Surrealist Abstract Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
- Dinner in the SkyBy Valton TylerLocated in Dallas, TXIn The New York Times Arts in America column, Edward M. Gomez writes of Valton Tyler, "visionary seems the right word for describing his vivid, unusual and technically refined paintings, prints and drawings, whose style defies convenient labels. Abstract, surreal, cartoonish, sci-fi fantastic, metaphysical, apocalyptic-Baroque - all of these fit but also fall short of fully describing his art." (Edward M. Gomez, "Futuristic Forms Frolic Under Eerie Texan Skies...Category
1970s Surrealist Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
- Tsunami II- surreal painting blue grey shadesBy Fernando VignoliLocated in Miami, FLProfessionally known as Vignoli, was a Brazilian painter and sculptor. He began his career in 1982 creating canvases in oil on canvas, where he applies his own technique, which, according to him, allows a perfect balance in the distribution of the elements, leading the viewer to come across texture, plasticity and creation, in perfect harmony within the history of each painting. The style of Vignoli is a fusion between Surrealism and Expressionism, hence the declared influence by the Spanish master...Category
2010s Surrealist Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
- Bossa Nova, Surreal painting oil on canvas, sepia, brown and white shadesBy Fernando VignoliLocated in Miami, FLProfessionally known as Vignoli, was a Brazilian painter and sculptor. He began his career in 1982 creating canvases in oil on canvas, where he applies his own technique, which, acco...Category
2010s Surrealist Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
- "Blue Water"- Horizontal surreal painting with blue & grey shades, oil on canvasBy Fernando VignoliLocated in Miami, FLProfessionally known as Vignoli, was a Brazilian painter and sculptor. He began his career in 1982 creating canvases in oil on canvas, where he applies his own technique, which, acco...Category
2010s Surrealist Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
- The Man That Eats Abaporu. oil on canvas surreal paintingBy Fernando VignoliLocated in Miami, FLProfessionally known as Vignoli, was a Brazilian painter and sculptor. He began his career in 1982 creating canvases in oil on canvas, where he appli...Category
2010s Surrealist Paintings
MaterialsCanvas, Oil
Recently Viewed
View AllMore Ways To Browse
Bottoms Up
Ocean Abstract Art
Abstract With Ocean
Surrealist Painting Canvas
Ocean Painting Abstract
Contemporary Ocean Painting
Vintage Ocean
Vintage Oceanic
Chief Painting
Two Brothers Painting
Vintage Ocean Art
American Painting Ocean
Village People Painting
Mid Century Abstract Expressionism
Midcentury Abstract Expressionism
Abstract Surrealist Oil Painting
Robert Summers
3 Sons Painting