- Artist
- Matta (Roberto Matta Echaurren) 1911–2002
- Original title
- La Vertu noire
- Medium
- Oil paint on canvas
- Dimensions
- Support: 765 × 1826 mm
frame: 842 × 1901 × 65 mm - Collection
- Tate
- Acquisition
- Purchased 1970
- Reference
- T01232
Summary
Black Virtue is an oil painting made on three canvases that have been joined to form a long, horizontally orientated triptych. Each of the three parts of the triptych is a different width, resulting in an asymmetrical composition. The dominant colour in the painting is black, with further areas of red, green, blue, purple, brown, yellow and cream. In the two outer panels, the painted forms are largely abstract. The pictorial space of the panel on the left-hand side is articulated by floating fragments of black planes that open up the perspective into an organic, amorphous, cavernous space. In the narrower right-hand section there are fragmentary planes, some of which are laid next to one other, while others give the impression of partially overlapping on a flatter surface, without creating the impression of a deep perspectival pictorial space. In the central canvas, which is the widest, the painted forms are more linear and biomorphic than those that flank them. They are set against a black background and some of them take the shape of female sex organs.
This work was painted at Cape Ann, near Boston, in 1943 by the Chilean artist Matta (Roberto Matta Echaurren). In 1971 Matta stated that although he could not recall the exact significance of the painting’s title, it might ‘even refer to the so-called virtue in wartime of killing the enemy’ (quoted in Wilson 1975, p.16). The large areas of black in the painting may also allude to death (see Wilson 1975, p.16). Around the same period that he made Black Virtue, the artist worked on several other triptychs that the curator Ronald Alley has suggested were ‘based on the idea of introducing deliberate contradictions and opposing different elements, somewhat in the tradition of triptychs by Old Masters with a central panel and contrasting wings’ (Alley 1981, p.503). In a letter of 18 August 1971, the art dealer Pierre Matisse wrote that Matta made two other such triptychs the same year as Black Virtue was created: Prince of the Blood (Tragyptic) and Redness of Lead.
The artistic strategy of opposing different and even contradictory elements was inspired by the surrealist principles of automatism and free association. In order to achieve these effects, Matta made his paintings by covering over one part while he painted the next. In the period that he made Black Virtue, Matta was also working on an experimental project in ‘correspondence’ with the French poet Charles Duits. In this project, Matta would make a drawing and Duits would write a poem at eleven o’clock every morning, after which they would compare the results. Parts of the imagery of Black Virtue relate to a certain extent to some of these drawings.
Matta joined the French surrealist group in 1937 under the encouragement of the movement’s founder André Breton. He became acquainted with key surrealist artists and published articles and illustrations in Surrealist journals such as Minotaure. Art critic and curator Simon Wilson mentions that in this painting Matta ‘was concerned with capturing the inner world of the mind’, claiming that ‘Black Virtue evokes a fluid mental landscape in an extreme combination of eroticism and violence’ (Wilson 1975, p.16).
Further reading
Simon Wilson, Surrealist Painting, London 1975, p.16, reproduced pl.47.
Ronald Alley, Catalogue of the Tate Gallery’s Collection of Modern Art other than Works by British Artists, London 1981, pp.502–3, reproduced p.502.
Hans Ulrich Obrist, ‘Resistor: Surrealist Roberto Matta Interviewed Before His Death’, Tate Magazine, no.4, 1 April 2003, reproduced, http://www.tate.org.uk/context-comment/articles/resistor-surrealist-roberto-matta-interviewed-before-his-death, accessed 10 June 2016.
Natasha Adamou
June 2016
Supported by the Terra Foundation for American Art.
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Catalogue entry
Matta Echaurren born 1912
T01232 La Vertu noire
(Black Virtue) 1943
Left-hand canvas inscribed on reverse '2 out' and on stretcher 'haut', 'bas' and 'PM 90'; centre canvas inscribed on reverse 'Matta | amagansett' and on stretcher 'Vertu noire', 'haut', 'bas' and 'PM 90A'; right-hand canvas inscribed on stretcher (apparently not in the artist's hand) 'Matta "La Vertu noire" 1943' and 'PM 90C'
Oil on canvas, triptych; overall dimensions, 30 1/8 x 71 7/8 (76.5 x 182.5). Left-hand canvas, 30 1/8 x 22 (76.5 x 56); centre canvas, 30 1/8 x 35 3/8 (76.5 x 90.5); right-hand canvas, 30 1/8 x 14 (76.5 x 35.5)
Purchased from Mme Andrée Stassart (Grant-in-Aid) 1970
Prov:
With Pierre Matisse Gallery, New York (purchased from the artist); Mme Andrée Stassart, Paris, who organised the exhibition at Gallery 21
Exh:
Matta, Pierre Matisse Gallery, New York, February-March 1944 (5); Matta, Galerie René Drouin, Paris, July-August 1947 (12, repr.); Accrochage 1, Gallery 21, Zurich, summer 1970 (works not numbered, repr. in colour)
Repr:
Simon Wilson, The Surrealists
(London 1974), pl.28 in colour; Simon Wilson, Surrealist Painting
(London 1975), pl.47 in colour
Painted at Cape Ann, near Boston, in 1943.
The artist said (19 May 1971) that he cannot remember the exact significance of the title, but 'Black Virtue' may even refer to the so-called virtue in wartime of killing the enemy. He and his friends were extremely anti-Nazi at this period. It was painted shortly before he made 'The Vertigo of Eros' 1944 now in the Museum of Modern Art, New York.
He confirmed that the painting was executed as a triptych and said that he made several triptychs at this time based on the idea of introducing deliberate contradictions and opposing different elements, somewhat in the tradition of triptychs by Old Masters with a central panel and contrasting wings. However because of his interest in automatism and free association he sometimes (as in this work) painted his pictures in sections, covering over one part while he painted the next, and so on. At roughly the same period he was carrying on a 'correspondence' with the French poet Charles Duits whereby he made a small drawing at 11 o'clock every morning and the poet wrote something at the same time; and afterwards they compared results. An article about this experiment was published in VVV, Nos.2-3, March 1943, pp.15-26. Some of the drawings relate to a certain extent to images in this picture.
Pierre Matisse (letter of 18 August 1971) states that he had two other triptychs painted the same year. These were apparently 'Prince of the Blood (Tragyptic)' (reproduced in VVV, No.4, February 1944, p.64) and 'Redness of Lead'. Both of these, like 'Black Virtue', are made up of panels of unequal widths and are therefore asymmetrical in structure.
Published in:
Ronald Alley, Catalogue of the Tate Gallery's Collection of Modern Art other than Works by British Artists, Tate Gallery and Sotheby Parke-Bernet, London 1981, pp.502-3, reproduced p.502
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