Psychological Morphology
Roberto Matta
Considering the absolute inventiveness, and the magisterial incitement to exploration and discovery
that one encounters in the visual works of Matta, it is obvious that he was the greatest painter of the
20th Century, and most likely of the 21st as well. It is the pure explosion
of a mysterious and magical knowledge that excites, and undermines the otherwise mundane and aesthetic
history of "art" with it's boring reasons for being. Matta stands alone and points the way...
*
Preliminary Translation and Notes by Pierre Petiot
In autumn 1938, Matta launched the expression psychological morphology. He spoke about it in Les Deux Magots* with large gestures and using the objects which were at hand, in front of an impassive Breton who declared not to have understood anything of it. He asked Matta to write down his theories. This was difficult for Matta, not due to the fact that he did not have ideas enough, but because it was causing him to lose his momentum. But he succeeded in producing this text:
Psychological Morphology Any form is the diagram* resulting from the adaptation of the moving internal energies to obstacles created by the environment. The morphology of swirls, osmotic growths, periodic precipitates, indicates the diagram of non-miscible bodies, such as stains of car oil in damp streets, or the layout of two Ripolin* colors. Time would be for us a medium* comparable to a gelatinous water accepting in a rhythmical way transformations occurring with high or less high speeds. The eye is tuned on a certain speed only. Psychologically, a morphology of optical images only relates to the theoretical sections* made at a given moment in the morphological age of the object. I call psychological morphology the diagram of the transformations according to the absorption and the transmission, of the energies in the object from its initial aspect until it reaches its final form in the geodesic psychological medium*. This medium, psychological space-time, is a symbolic congruence of the Euclidian space. The object located in a given moment-point of this medium intercepts the pulsations which are proposing transformations according to an infinity of directions. It is located at the impact point between this encounter and each transformation. The infinity of the chances of interpenetrations missed by the object increases the intensity of the further pulsations during all the time the object will follow this morphological direction.
The concept of a psychological-time medium in which the objects are transforming, leads to compare it with an Euclidian space caught in a rotative and pulsatile transformation in which the object, with each risk of interpenetration may oscillate from point-volume to moment-eternity, from attraction-repulsion to past-future, from light-shadow to matter-movement. The fourth dimension would be the diagram of the risks encountered during the complete duration of the transformations.
In the area of consciousness, a morphological psychology would be the diagram of ideas. It should be conceived before optical images may give us the form of ideas if we want to stay in the transforming medium. The optical image is only a theoretical section* within the morphological fall of the object.
The image is retained* to calm the anxiety. Only one among the possible forms of the object is preserved.
Reality is the sequence of the explosive convulsions modeled in a pulsatile and rotative medium exposed to rhythms. The eye as the agent of memory is a means to simplify. The consciousness of the development of a psychological morphology in the passional or spiritual sense* leads to a pneumo-optics of the object. This pneumo-optics, which is a congruence of perspective, generates the creation of specific sciences. So, the diagram of the idea of a snow ball thrown on a flame shall be a splitting in two without deformation*, whereas the emotional libido awakened by a river or a tree shall be expressed by an osmotic growth in the geodesic psychological medium, true gelatin of blood stained milk in periodic precipitate.
Such a morphology shall be perceived when the eye and the consciousness shall draw the immediate and impulsive diagrams of man's convulsive emotion in a new art. The perception of the growth and of the accidents of objects when achieved simultaneously shall allow to feel the psychological biology of the object. The co-psychology of the opposites in a single idea-object remains pulsatile without deformation* in a psychological morphology, whereas the symbolist trials called paranoia-critique are based on a transformation of optical images in a caricatural sense*. The same happens with the forms of the so-called abstract art.
To my knowledge, this text was the first emanation of surrealism to venture in an unexplored territory beyond dreams.
At this moment, the fireworks of Matta's images popped out too quickly for being expressed into words. Before a given idea could come to light completely, another one was already pushing it. Matta suggested that the eye was only perceiving a slice of reality and that psychological morphology was giving a more complete image of it.
But beyond the theories, what was emerging, to my opinion, was the desire to explore the depths of the unconscious, and by so doing, to get access to a life with new dimensions.
Breton took care not to comment about psychological morphology at first, but the formula was going its way, and was to contribute later to the emergence of the Grands Transparents idea.
Translation notes:
Les Deux Magots: a quite known Café in Paris.
diagram: as you could probably see, the word used in the French text is "graphique", which does not fit correctly in English.
The effect suggested by the way Matta uses the word "graphique" could be rendered by something in between "graphical thing" (or "graphism") and "diagram" and "graph".Ripolin: a trade-mark known in France for good quality paint.
milieu: the French word "milieu" means both medium and milieu (environment)
section: "slice" would fit too
sense: the word "sens" in French means more immediately than in English both "sense" and "direction".
(That's quite handy when dealing with semiotics, because it keeps you permanently in mind that the meaning has a lot to do with the future).retained: I used this word for the French "retenue". It is probably not a good idea, because the English words "kept", "preserved" would probably fit better. My actual problem is that "retenir" in French also means "to memorize" and "to hold back".
deformation: "distortion" would probably be better.
Selected notes by Matta
Introduction
Ces notes sont une partie des citations extraites des Carnets de Matta qui sont reproduites dans l'article de Jean-Philippe Domecq "Ni peintre, ni poète ni philosophe ni Matta" publié page 67 du catalogue de l'exposition Matta au Musée National d'Art Moderne Centre Georges Pompidou en 1985.
These notes are extracted from Jean-Philippe Domecq's article called "Ni peintre, ni poète ni philosophe ni Matta" published page 67 of the catalog of the Matta exhibition in Musée National d'Art Moderne Centre Georges Pompidou in 1985.
"Sans carte ni guide d'où nous vivons, l'aveugle entreprise quotidienne est conduite avec héroisme ; mais pour ne pas devenir fou, il me faut dessiner, essiner ssiner et ner, r"
"Without a map nor a guide from where we live, the blind daily enterprise is led with heroism; but in order not to get mad, I have to draw raw, and aw, w"
"Sans vision de l'oeil, toute représentation reste aveugle. Et les raisonnements qui s'ensuivent restent insuffisants, impuissants.
C'est par rapport aux horizons que le verbe Voir peut construire (servir à construire) la corrélation des perspectives et prospectives""Without a vision from the eye, any representation stays blind. And the reasoning that follows stays insufficient, impotent.
It is in relationship with horizons that the verb To See can build (serve to build) the correlation of perspectives and porspectives"
"Si tout bruit contient déjà un sens, l'automatisme est la méthode pour tirer de l'ordre de chaque situation de désordre, et non création de désordre (mon conflit avec l'expressionisme abstrait). On dérègle le sens, mais toujours pour avoir le sens"
(Note: il n'y a pas jeu de mots, c'est bien du même sens qu'il s'agit)"If any noise contains a meaning already, then automatism is the method for drawing some order out of any situation of disorder, and not a creation of disorder (my conflict with abstract expressionism). You disturb the sense, but always to get the sense"
(Note: there is no real play on words above according to me, it is the same sense that Matta speaks about)
"L'administration manque d'images pour administrer. Nous n'avons pas de cartes, dans le sens géographique, des morphologies du matérialisme social ; de même, nous n'avons ni conventions géométriques, ni notations algébriques.
Parmi les disciplines traditionnelles du verbe Voir il y en a d'autres que celle que l'on appelle Optique. C'est avec ces autres disciplines que le verbe Voir pourrait élaborer une géographie sociale et pourrait voir ce qu'on ne voit pas.
Comment tirer de la carrière économique de quoi tracer à grands traits une économie ?
J'entends par grands traits des néologismes, des idées algébriques en x, en y, en z qui entreraient en fonction""The administration lacks of images for administrating. We do not have maps, in the geographical meaning of the morphologies of social materialism ; similarly, we do not have anything like géometrical conventions or algebraic notations.
Among the traditional dsiciplines of the verb To See, there are more than the one called Optics. It is with these other disciplines that the verb See could work out a social geography and could see what no one sees.
How could we draw out of the economical carry what would be necessary to outline an econography ?
By outline, I mean neologisms, algebraic ideas in x, in y, in z that would get in function"
"La poésie doit provoquer l'esprit scientifique à la manière d'une séduction, d'une corruption. Un Oedipe voyant aurait pu voir l'espace de l'espèce. Cet espace dont les navigateurs sont des artistes."
"Poetry must provoke the scientific mind in a similar way as a seduction, a corruption. A seeing Oedipe could have seen the space of the species. This space, the navigators of which are the artists"
"Le sujet du verbe Voir est au centre-noeud de nos erreurs"
"Nos angoisses sont des nébuleuses"
"The subject of the verb To See is at the node-center of our errors"
"Our anguishes are nebulae"
