Artist of the Day, December 4, 2024: Ewald Mataré, a German painter and sculptor (#2174)

Ewald Wilhelm Hubert Mataré (1887 – 1965) was a German painter and sculptor, who dealt with, among other things, the figures of men and animals in a stylized form.

Mataré began his instruction as an artist at the Prussian Academy of Arts in Berlin in 1907. He was a student of Prof. Julius Ehrentraut, Lovis Corinth, and History painter Arthur Kampf. In 1918, he joined the November Group. Mataré first dedicated himself to sculpture after finishing his painting studies. A great part of his sculpted work are of animal figures.

In 1932 he received a professorship at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. After the Machtergreifung of 1933 however, all cultural and artistic life in Germany was brought into ideological alignment by the Nazis; Mataré was denounced as "degenerate" and expelled from his position. One of his sculptures "Die Katze" (The cat) was placed into the exhibition of shame and derision "Entartete Kunst" (Degenerate Art) staged by the Nazis in Munich, 1937. Church commissions became his sole source of income.

After the war, Mataré was asked to become the director of the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, but he quickly resigned, because he felt there were still too many professors at the Akademie who had been actively teaching there during the Third Reich. Furthermore, no one was interested in his ambitious reform plans, which would have allowed fourteen-year-olds to study at the Akademie. However he was active at the Academy – albeit in an off-site studio – for long enough to teach artists like Günter Haese, Erwin Heerich, Georg Meistermann, Hannes Rosenow, and, most famously, Joseph Beuys. During the post-war era, Mataré took many commissions from the public sector; he also worked on many churches, e.g. he built four doors for the south portal of the Cologne Cathedral.

Matare's work varies from the simplicity of his animal forms in which he explores shape and line, to the profound spirituality of his religious works. A 2006 exhibition of his work in Salzburg, Austria, demonstrated the heights which his work could achieve.

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Ewald Mataré

Double Chicken (Doppelhuhn), circa 1951

Schüssel mit reitendem Bogenschützen, circa 1950

Hahn, circa 1948-49

Zeichen einer Kuh, circa 1948

Rundmedallion mit Hahn II, circa 1948

Eingekauertes Rind II, circa 1947

Zeichen eines Steppenrindes, circa 1946

Zeichen einer Kuh I, circa 1946

Mathematik-Kuh II, circa 1946

Liegende Kuh, circa 1945

 Pfeifenschale, circa 1944-45

Chinesisches Pferd, circa 1943

Stehende Kuh (Maulwurfskuh), circa 1936

Porzellankuh, circa 1936

Maulwurfskuh",  circa 1936

Kleine liegende Kuh II  Porzellankuh, circa 1936

Steinbock, circa 1935

Steinbock, circa 1935

ToterKrieger, circa 1934

Liegende Kuh, circa 1932

Grosse liegende Kuh, circa 1930

Grazing  cow II, circa 1930

Grazing  cow 1, circa 1930

Finnisches Pferd, circa 1929-30

Kleine liegende Kuh, circa 1929

Finnisches Rind, circa 1929

Four Red Cows, circa 1925

Stehende Kuh  "Windkuh", circa 1923

Female head (Hanna H), circa 1922

Owl-form door handle

Angel at the Bishop's apartments of the Diocese of Essen