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MATTIS-TEUTSCH, János
MATTIS-TEUTSCH, János
Painter, graphic artist, sculptor
(13 Aug. 1884, Brassó–17 March, 1960, Brassó/Braşov, RO)
1901-1902: Applied Arts School of Budapest; 1902-1905: Fine Arts Academy of Munich; Between 1906 and 1908 he traveled to Paris on a study-tour. Mattis-Teutsch was a European ranked master of the avant-garde arts, who built his unmatched oeuvre linking in to the styles of expressionism, constructivism, and the abstract. During the period of his artistic preparation spanning from 1908 to 1915 he left behind reality-based portrayal for the spirit of modern formation. Between 1916 and 1917 the periodical MA of Lajos Kassák published a number of his etchings. His independent album containing his linoleum segments was published. In 1918 he joined the Abstrakte Gruppe der Strum of Berlin lead by Walden Herwarth. In 1919 he came into contact with the Bauhaus group of Weimar. Following the fall of the soviet republic he returned to Brussels. He began painting his series entitled Lélekvirágok between 1919 and 1924 as a closing of his abstract period. His relationship did not cease however with the European movements, nor with the Strum circle of Berlin. His stay in Paris in 1925 helped to strengthen these ties. He linked into the creative circle and avant-garde periodical the Contimporanul of Bucharest. Besides his artistic creative activities he was deeply interested in theoretical aesthetic issues. His work entitled Kunstideologie was published in Potsdam in 1931, which constituted a theoretical summarization of his constructivist period (demonstrated with etchings). Mattis-Teutsch withdrew from artistic life from 1933 until the end of the World War. He attended anatomy classes, and prepared designs for frescos. He was the head of the fine arts group of Brussels from 1957 till 1959. He painted compositions with a realist attitude, structured however in a surrealist manner. His success was suppressed by the Dogmatist art politics of the time. The rediscovery of his work came only much later on. On the centenary of his birth Hungarian art history researchers, finally settling a multi-decade liability, finally paid tribute to his contribution to the avant-garde movements of Europe.
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The first abstract compositions appeared in Wassily Kandinsky's studio around 1910. János Máttis Teutsch, a near contemporary, was the most significant Hungarian exponent of the type of Expressionism that worked in non-representational forms. He originally trained as a sculptor (studying in Munich between 1902 and 1905 and then going to Paris several times around the middle of the decade) and he later taught sculpture and the history of style at the technical college in Brassó. For all his fine sculptures it was as a painter and graphic artist that he was significant. His mature style developed in the mid-1910s. The surfaces of his pictures are filled with an endless flow of swirling lines, and the depiction of trees, hills and human figures in tortuous Art-Nouveau style grows gradually more and more abstract and finally becomes completely non-figurative. The black-and-white dynamic in his engravings has an almost rumbling effect, and his paintings, in which lessons drawn from the colouring of Gauguin, Matisse and van Gogh have been assimilated, confess the secrets of the soul. It was not only Kassák, as editor of the periodicals Ma ("Today") and Tett ("Deed") who picked up on the merits of this organic art with its connections to music (he published many of his engravings in Ma). The same was true of the Sturm Gallery, Expressionism's leading intellectual forum, where at the invitation of Herwarth Walden he first showed his works jointly with Klee in 1921 and then took part in a collective exhibition. Braºov was a long way from the centres of art, and Máttis Teutsch grew increasingly isolated. He did publish a collection of essays entitled Kunstideologie in Potsdam in 1931, where he summarised his teaching experiences and drew on the doctrines of the Constructivist aesthetic; but he withdrew from artistic life soon afterwards. It was only after the war that he resumed his creative activity, in which idioms of Socialist Realism also appear. (Júlia Szabó: János Máttis Teutsch. Budapest, 1983, with extracts in German.)[József Vadas: Hungarian Masterpieces (Vadas József : A magyar festészet remekei), translator: Godfrey Offord, Corvina Publishers, 2004.] One-Man Shows:
1917 • Exhibition Room of the "Ma", Budapest
1918 • Vienna • Sturm, Berlin • Exhibition Room of the "Ma", Budapest
1921 • Sturm [with Paul Klee], Berlin • Brassó
1925 • Visconti Galerie, Paris • Klingsor Exhibition Room, Brassó
1929 • Brassó • KÚT, Budapest • Tamás Gallery, Budapest [with Gyula Hincz and László Mészáros]
1930 • Redout, Brassó
1932 • Bucarest
1933 • Redout, Brassó
1947 • Brassó
1971 • Dalles Hall, Bucarest
1999 • Hungarian National Gallery, Budapest. Selected Group Exhibitions:
1916 • Association of Hungarian Watercolour and Pastel Painters, National Salon, Budapest
1921 • Group Exhibition of The Sturm, Berlin
1924 • International Exhibition of Contimporanul, Bucarest
1928 • International Exhibition of Abstract Art, Berlin
1929 • Academy of Applied Arts, Bucarest
1930 • Exhibition of Transylvanian Artists, Kolozsvár
1996 • Art of Nagybánya, Hungarian National Gallery, Budapest. Bibliography:
Banner, Z.: ~ (monogr.), Bukarest, 1972
Passuth, K.: Magyar mûvészek az európai avantgarde-ban, Budapest, 1974
Szabó, J.: A magyar aktivizmus mûvészete, Budapest, 1981; Budapest, 1999
Szabó, J.: ~ (monogr.), Budapest, 1983
Majoros, V.: ~ (monogr.), Budapest, 1998.
Painter, graphic artist, sculptor
(13 Aug. 1884, Brassó–17 March, 1960, Brassó/Braşov, RO)
1901-1902: Applied Arts School of Budapest; 1902-1905: Fine Arts Academy of Munich; Between 1906 and 1908 he traveled to Paris on a study-tour. Mattis-Teutsch was a European ranked master of the avant-garde arts, who built his unmatched oeuvre linking in to the styles of expressionism, constructivism, and the abstract. During the period of his artistic preparation spanning from 1908 to 1915 he left behind reality-based portrayal for the spirit of modern formation. Between 1916 and 1917 the periodical MA of Lajos Kassák published a number of his etchings. His independent album containing his linoleum segments was published. In 1918 he joined the Abstrakte Gruppe der Strum of Berlin lead by Walden Herwarth. In 1919 he came into contact with the Bauhaus group of Weimar. Following the fall of the soviet republic he returned to Brussels. He began painting his series entitled Lélekvirágok between 1919 and 1924 as a closing of his abstract period. His relationship did not cease however with the European movements, nor with the Strum circle of Berlin. His stay in Paris in 1925 helped to strengthen these ties. He linked into the creative circle and avant-garde periodical the Contimporanul of Bucharest. Besides his artistic creative activities he was deeply interested in theoretical aesthetic issues. His work entitled Kunstideologie was published in Potsdam in 1931, which constituted a theoretical summarization of his constructivist period (demonstrated with etchings). Mattis-Teutsch withdrew from artistic life from 1933 until the end of the World War. He attended anatomy classes, and prepared designs for frescos. He was the head of the fine arts group of Brussels from 1957 till 1959. He painted compositions with a realist attitude, structured however in a surrealist manner. His success was suppressed by the Dogmatist art politics of the time. The rediscovery of his work came only much later on. On the centenary of his birth Hungarian art history researchers, finally settling a multi-decade liability, finally paid tribute to his contribution to the avant-garde movements of Europe.
***************************************************************
The first abstract compositions appeared in Wassily Kandinsky's studio around 1910. János Máttis Teutsch, a near contemporary, was the most significant Hungarian exponent of the type of Expressionism that worked in non-representational forms. He originally trained as a sculptor (studying in Munich between 1902 and 1905 and then going to Paris several times around the middle of the decade) and he later taught sculpture and the history of style at the technical college in Brassó. For all his fine sculptures it was as a painter and graphic artist that he was significant. His mature style developed in the mid-1910s. The surfaces of his pictures are filled with an endless flow of swirling lines, and the depiction of trees, hills and human figures in tortuous Art-Nouveau style grows gradually more and more abstract and finally becomes completely non-figurative. The black-and-white dynamic in his engravings has an almost rumbling effect, and his paintings, in which lessons drawn from the colouring of Gauguin, Matisse and van Gogh have been assimilated, confess the secrets of the soul. It was not only Kassák, as editor of the periodicals Ma ("Today") and Tett ("Deed") who picked up on the merits of this organic art with its connections to music (he published many of his engravings in Ma). The same was true of the Sturm Gallery, Expressionism's leading intellectual forum, where at the invitation of Herwarth Walden he first showed his works jointly with Klee in 1921 and then took part in a collective exhibition. Braºov was a long way from the centres of art, and Máttis Teutsch grew increasingly isolated. He did publish a collection of essays entitled Kunstideologie in Potsdam in 1931, where he summarised his teaching experiences and drew on the doctrines of the Constructivist aesthetic; but he withdrew from artistic life soon afterwards. It was only after the war that he resumed his creative activity, in which idioms of Socialist Realism also appear. (Júlia Szabó: János Máttis Teutsch. Budapest, 1983, with extracts in German.)[József Vadas: Hungarian Masterpieces (Vadas József : A magyar festészet remekei), translator: Godfrey Offord, Corvina Publishers, 2004.] One-Man Shows:
1917 • Exhibition Room of the "Ma", Budapest
1918 • Vienna • Sturm, Berlin • Exhibition Room of the "Ma", Budapest
1921 • Sturm [with Paul Klee], Berlin • Brassó
1925 • Visconti Galerie, Paris • Klingsor Exhibition Room, Brassó
1929 • Brassó • KÚT, Budapest • Tamás Gallery, Budapest [with Gyula Hincz and László Mészáros]
1930 • Redout, Brassó
1932 • Bucarest
1933 • Redout, Brassó
1947 • Brassó
1971 • Dalles Hall, Bucarest
1999 • Hungarian National Gallery, Budapest. Selected Group Exhibitions:
1916 • Association of Hungarian Watercolour and Pastel Painters, National Salon, Budapest
1921 • Group Exhibition of The Sturm, Berlin
1924 • International Exhibition of Contimporanul, Bucarest
1928 • International Exhibition of Abstract Art, Berlin
1929 • Academy of Applied Arts, Bucarest
1930 • Exhibition of Transylvanian Artists, Kolozsvár
1996 • Art of Nagybánya, Hungarian National Gallery, Budapest. Bibliography:
Banner, Z.: ~ (monogr.), Bukarest, 1972
Passuth, K.: Magyar mûvészek az európai avantgarde-ban, Budapest, 1974
Szabó, J.: A magyar aktivizmus mûvészete, Budapest, 1981; Budapest, 1999
Szabó, J.: ~ (monogr.), Budapest, 1983
Majoros, V.: ~ (monogr.), Budapest, 1998.
