André Masson and the Telluric Myths

Fleeing the Occupation, André Masson and André Breton arrive in New York in 1941, after a three-week stay in Martinique. Although impressed by the metropolis, André Masson, as always, found nature far more appealing than the chaotic pace of the city. He settled in New England, near Lake Waramaug, where he was visited by Calder, Kay Sage, Yves Tanguy and Arshile Gorky, and exhibited in the United States, notably with Kurt Valentin and Pierre Matisse.

André Masson's work is one of continuous metamorphosis. In the United States, inspired by the wild, spectacular landscape so different from the more pleasant European landscape, he once again changed his way of painting, even if the mythical theme persisted. His works reflect the fertility of American soils, as well as the violence of extreme atmospheric phenomena. He allows himself to be carried along by new, more dynamic and violent pulsations:
“...the paintings have become infinitely more violent. The influence of climate is indisputable. There's also this terrible, aggressive light, no mist...Seized by the earthly force and violent climate of this region, I seek and perhaps find pictorial correspondences of elemental forces. Telluric mysteries. Phenomena of hatching and germination also find their transposition in numerous canvases and pastels.”

The theme of the werewolf, a mythical monster, certainly refers to the savagery of nature. Masson brings his sense of myth and legend to the natural landscape, and the animal becomes totemic, a symbol of primal, primitive and magical forces. In his capacity as a human being with the ability to transform himself into a wild beast, the figure of the werewolf recalls that of the Minotaur - a metaphor for the savage forces of the unconscious that lurk behind civilization, a hybrid creature between man and animal. Color, too, becomes brighter, line more dynamic and abstract.

It's impossible not to recall the influence André Masson's American period had on Abstract Expressionism in its early days, and especially on the work of Jackson Pollock. It's likely that Pollock met Masson at Stanley W. Hayter's Atelier 17 in New York, where Masson worked on prints. The two artists shared the same totemic vision of the forces of nature. Jackson Pollock was marked by the presence of surrealist artists during the war: works such as Moon-Woman Cuts the Circle, 1943, show a vision close to Masson's surrealism of the same period.