MAgriTTA Chair
Design Date 1970
Designer Roberto Matta (1911-2002, Chilean)
Manufacturer Gavina (1946-1968) / Knoll International (1938-present), Foligno, Italy
Media acrylic fabric over polyurethane foam
Dimensions 24 x 32 x 38 inches
Roberto Matta designed this chair as a tribute to his friend and fellow surrealist painter René Magritte. The apple and black bowler hat are two of Magritte’s trademarks, derived from his 1946 self-portrait The Son of Man. In the painting, Magritte shows himself wearing a black suit, bowler hat and red necktie. The surrealist aspect is a green apple floating mid-air which hides his face. Matta playfully adapted the painting by creating a fiberglass bowler hat, set upside-down, with a green foam apple inside it. When sat on, the foam of the apple would have compressed into the hat. The name MAgriTTA is a combination of the names Magritte and Matta.
ON VIEW in Postmodern Gallery 8
Markings unmarked
Credit Line Collection Kirkland Museum of Fine & Decorative Art
Accession Number 2004.1979
