Provincetown V, 1940
Zurich, 1935


Archer, 1940
Born in Engelberg, Switzerland, in 1907, Matter studied painting at the Beaux Arts in Geneva and with Fernand Leger in Paris. Early in his career he designed travel posters for the Swiss National Tourist Office winning international acclaim for his pioneering use of photomontage combined with type. After settling in the United States in 1936 he worked for leading magazines, Knoll Furniture and other clients and taught photography and graphic arts at Yale for thirty years. Matter was a photographer who evolved much of his work in the darkroom. Whatever the subject, his work was purely visual in approach. A master technician, he used every method available to achieve his vision of light, form and texture. Manipulation of the negative, retouching, cropping, enlarging and light drawing are some of the techniques he used to achieve the fresh, enignatic form he sought in his still lifes, landscapes, nudes and portraits. Herbert Matter exhibitions include the Los Angeles Museum of Fine Art, The Yale University School of Art and Architecture, the Kunsthalle Museum, Zurich and the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

Abstraction
Giacometti's Figures

Rocks

Seagram Building

Provincetown III, 1940

Composition with Limes