Richard Mattsson
I began painting and drawing from direct observation in the early eighties after twenty five years of working more or less abstractly and primarily from imagination. My early schooling at the Minneapolis School of Art in the late fifties, was largely influenced by the psychological and existential forces that surrounded abstract expressionist thinking. I attended the Minneapolis School of Art immediately following U.S Army service in Japan where I was first introduced to Buddhist thought and oriental culture in general. I have only recently come to realize how those early experiences have unconsciously informed my process. Painting has become a form of present and discovery oriented meditative practice.
For me, painting is dancing to visual music.
Initially, my choice of subject matter was intuitive. I began to paint what I saw before me with no predetermined attitude toward the outcome other than it had to feel right. While I don't subscribe to any "isms," I do consider myself to be a formalist with an interest in pattern, color and expressive composition. I try to appropriately respond to the circumstances of my experience in a manner balanced between external and internal observation. The place or situation of landscape appeals to me particularly because it is an ever changing unpredictable event. Painting, listening, dancing, and gardening are all exciting influences in that they all require that I surrender to the forces of life that play in the moment.
The fact is, I have enjoyed making both images and objects since childhood. The process has been magical, spiritually vital, and integral to my sense of being.
Personal Statement
Visual and auditory experience are major sources of sensory stimulation in my life. Seeing and hearing inspire within me, spontaneous intuitive expression that I deem to be celebratory in nature. I have, since childhood, felt drawing, painting, and making to be magical activities.
Image making is, and has been for me, inspired by visual discoveries that stimulate interaction in much the same way a seductive partner invites me to dance. My partner and I mutually celebrate. I paint what feels right visually and pictorially at the moment.
The unpredictable character of the ever-changing natural outdoor landscape intrigues me. I experience the event that is the sum of what is happening both internally and externally. I typically begin with an initial on site experience that sets the painting process in motion. While I start from direct visual response to the subject, I proceed editorially with decisions based essentially on what intuitively feels right –pictorially. From the beginning, I paint holistically. Since each stroke changes the whole image in much the same way that notes alter musical compositions, I measure the effect that each stroke has on the overall pictorial composition at the moment of its occurrence.
Each work is inspired by an event/experience discovery that informs me. I am led by it. To me, painting is a kind of dancing meditation. Its meaning is in the joy of doing it.
Picasso has been quoted as having said “I don’t seek,I find!”The present and discovery oriented attitude suggested in this statement is also what I embrace.
CV
BORN 1935 Minneapolis, Mn.
EDUCATION
M.F.A. 1965 Painting University of Washington - Seattle
B.F.A. 1961 Painting Minneapolis School of Art
1960 Yale –Norfolk School of Music and Art - Summer
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2019 “Now and Then” Dec/Jan , Leedy Voulkos Art Center
2018 Weinberger Fine Art Gallery, Recent Paintings
2015 “Recent Figure Paintings” October, The Leedy Voulkos Art Center
2014 Truman Medical Center, Kansas City, Mo. - Paintings
2013 Leedy-Voulkos Art Center 25 Year Painting Retrospective
2009 Unit 5 Gallery, Kansas City, Mo. Drawings and paintings
2007 Unit 5 Gallery, Kansas City, Mo. Drawings and paintings
2005 Stocksdale Gallery, William Jewell College, Liberty, Missouri
2004 Campanella Gallery, Park College, Parkville, Mo.
2004 Heartland Gallery, Heartland Spine and Specialty Hospital, Overland Park, Ks.
1993 New Work, Leedy - Voulkos Gallery, Kansas City, Mo
1991 Athena on Broadway (Drawings and Prints)
1989 Leedy - Voulkos Gallery (Drawings and Paintings)
GROUP SHOWS
2017 Weinberger – Still Life Exhibition
2016 Weinberger Fine Art Summer Exhibit
2015 50th Anniversary of the Kansas City Art Institute Foundation Department Foundation present and former faculty
2015 “Pursuits” Bloch Art Space, Kansas City. Mo
2015 “Flint Hills”, Buttonwood Artspace, Kansas City, Mo
2014 Kansas City Collects, Invitational, Juried Exhibition
2014 “Prairie as Muse”, Strecker-Nelson Gallery, Manhattan, Ks.
2013 Flint Hills- Buttonwood Art Space, Kansas City, Mo
2013 “Flint Hills Masters” , Strecker Nelson Gallery,Manhattan, Ks
2011 Exhibition at Nelson-Strecker Gallery,
2011 Kansas City Art Institute Biennial Faculty Exhibition.
2012 “Urban Landscape” Strecker-Nelson Gallery, Manhattan,
2010 “Landscape” Dolphin Gallery, Kansas City, Mo
2006 Kansas City Artists Coalition Juried Members Exhibition
2004 Kansas City Flat File Invitational Exhibition, Bloch Art
2003 Faculty Collects - Bloch Art Space, KCAI
1999 “Art in the Woods“, Juried Exhibition, Overland Park, Ks
1996 “Landscape“ Invitational group Exhibition, Dolphin Gallery, Kansas City, Mo
1995 “Art in the Woods“, Juried Exhibition, Overland Park, Ks
1995 “Landscape” Invitational Exhibition Jan Weiner Gallery, Kansas City Mo
1993 “Winter Show” Groveland Gallery Minneapolis, Mn
1992 “Portraits” Dolphin Gallery Kansas City
1989 “A Decade Later“ Charlotte Crosby Kemper Gallery Kansas City Art Institute
1985 “The Granlund Influence“ Invitational Honoring Paul Granlund, Sculptor, Wayzata, Minnesota
1985 Nippon Club, New York, new York
PRESS
2013 Kansas City Star Review, Dec. 18, Retrospective Exhibition, Leedy-Voulkos Art Center, Kansas City, Mo
2009 Art KC 365 “He knows his places: Richard Mattsson at Unit 5 Gallery, Kansas City, Mo.
2007 Review Magazine exhibition review by Sherry Cromwell Lacy of Unit 5 Gallery Exhibition
2005 Kansas City Star review, November 10, 2005 of Stocksdale Gallery, Painting and Drawing exhibition
COLLECTIONS
Kansas City Power and Light
Country Club Plaza Bank, Kansas City Mo.
Sprint Corporation, Kansas City
Heartland Spine and Specialty Hospital, Overland Park,
Kansas City Kansas Community College
Louis Soslund, Kansas City, Mo
The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art, Kansas City,
Continental Insurance Corporation, New York
American Century Corporation, Kansas City
Gerhardt Kuti, Leawood, Kansas
Timothy Sotos, Kansas City, Missouri
Robert Harris, Columbia, Mo
AWARDS
2004 Missouri Governors Award For Teaching Excellence in Higher Education (Kansas City Art Institute)
1961 Ethel Morrison Van Derlip Scholarship for Travel and Study in Europe, Minneapolis School of Art
CURRENT EMPLOYMENT
1965 -2013 Professor, Foundation Department, Kansas City Art Institute - Retired