Jan Matulka • American (1890-1972)
Along the Cay • Watercolor on Paper 16" x 22-1/4"
Students loved Jan Matulka, their teacher at New York’s Art Students League. Most patrons hated him. It was not a good recipe for artistic or financial, success. Jan Matulka was the original “Bohemian” artist. He was born in a small town south of Prague before Bohemia became Czechoslovakia. A talented child, he arrived in America with his parents at age 16. After four years of design school he was the first recipient of a Joseph Pulitzer Traveling Scholarship to tour the American Southwest where he studied the art, customs and ceremonies of the Pueblo tribes.
From the adobe pueblos beneath wide southwestern skies, to the crowded boulevards of Paris, France, Matulka traveled an odd artistic route. On his first trip back to Europe, he fell in love with Paris and established a studio there, returning often through the 1920’s. In New York, he became a well-liked teacher at the Art Students League bringing European Modernism to students hungry for new ideas. However, on both sides of the Atlantic he managed to tick off potential patrons and gallery owners with his particular form of Bohemian rudeness. In his hands it was an art form.
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By 1933 he had worn out his welcome in Paris and returned full-time to America to ruffle feathers at the Depression-era Federal Arts Project (FAP), part of the WPA. He managed to keep a semblance of an art career going through World War II, but before the allies stormed the D-Day beaches, Matulka had drifted off the arts scene worldwide. He became lost in a mental isolation that lasted for a quarter of a century.
If you could get past the rude manner, Jan Matulka was an artists artist. He worked feverishly and constantly, even as he withdrew from the art world. His best-known style was Abstract Expressionism, but he was known to paint abstractly in the morning and switch to tranquil, realistic landscapes by afternoon.
Just before he died, a curious thing happened to Matulka. The bad boy of art became popular. It probably killed him. The students always loved him and the 1969 catalog for a retrospective exhibition of sculptor David Smith’s work named Matulka, his former teacher, as a major influence. His work began to sell and he even enjoyed a solo exhibition at the famed New York gallery of Robert Schoelkopf. But fame in life was not to be, as Jan Matulka died two short years later. A man so rude, he even turned his back on success.
Canton Museum of Art Permanent Collection • Purchased by the Canton Museum of Art, 2000.3
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1.
“In 1939 he helped found the American Abstract Artists group in New York City, then refused to join. A symptom of the mental health issues that would damage his later life.”
2.
“He was a revered teacher for many years, but his rudeness and increasing mental health issues putt off many prospective patrons and galleries. Not a recipe for success.”
3.
“Through no fault of his own, he found great success in the last two years of his life and after his death. A mention of his important influence in a former students show catalog led to increased sales of his work.”
4.
“You could say he was the first true Bohemian artist. He was born there.”
Matulka Timeline. Scroll over images to see timeline.
