Ramunchto Matta: Expanding human capacity

In conversation with Gary Cummiskey

Ramunchto Matta is a French composer and visual artist. He has worked with people such as Don Cherry, Brion Gysin, John Cage, Chris Marker, and Robert Wilson. He has released 34 solo CDs and collaborated on about 20 other albums. He has exhibited his visual work in Paris, New York, London, Madrid, Barcelona, Tokyo, and Rome.

A new book titled Hello Yes Hello: 30 Dialogues, containing conversations between Kathelin Gray and Ramuntcho Matta about Brion Gysin and William Burroughs, has just been published by Moloko Plus in Germany.

Photograph courtesy: Oona Matta

Your father was the Chilean surrealist painter Roberto Matta, who knew writers and artists such as Andre Breton, Joyce Mansour, Max Ernst, and Robert Motherwell. I imagine your childhood must have been interesting, with many famous artists around you. What was it like?

Everything was normal.

It was “normal” to sleep in a closet with holes in the door to be able to breathe.

It was “normal” to have a one-room apartment that was the studio of my father during
the day, the dining room in the evening, and the sleeping room of my father at night.

My mother was the one to bring the money home.

She was a designer and a political activist.

She left the United States because she was accused of being a communist: she created the first radio station that played African-American music.
Then she arrived in Rome and worked as a dancer in peplums.

She was raised in Rochester, New York, and had a very special neighbour. An old woman who organised salons. My mother met Marcel Duchamp, John Cage, and Martha Graham there.

As our flat was also the studio, it was very common to have visitors like Max Ernst, Dorothea Tanning, Asger Jorn, Öyvind Fahlström … Henri Michaux…

It was in Saint Germain des Prés, which was the centre of creativity … because it was a very cheap area … and it has a garden when you can walk and a lots of cafés … cafés were the only place with heat…

I remember that the discussions were always about improving the world and how we could help…

Brion Gysin, Tessa Pollitt and Ramuntcho Matta at the Final Academy concert, 1982

Brion Gysin and Ramuntcho Matta, early 1980s

It is well known that you met Brion Gysin when you were a teenager, and then later you did some musical collaborations and recordings with him. What were your immediate impressions of Gysin? Was he easy to work with?

“Work”?

Well … at the beginning it was more like being adopted.

It was my teacher that sent me to him.

I was 15 years old and totally lost.

My teacher offered me a “deal” … if I went to poetry and philosophy classes and went to help a friend of his who was dying, he would not tell my parents that I did not go to school. And if I did well, he would make me pass class every year.

So, every morning I went to Brion.

Help him to get dressed sometimes, clean the place.

And then I would roll a joint and he would go to his desk to write.

After one hour he would take a break and we would speak about a lot of different things … literature, science, art, history … and then he would go back to write, and I would go to buy some food… I would prepare lunch and go to school…

I came back at tea time (4:20) and almost every day William Burroughs would call and they would speak for about one hour… (I have no idea how that was possible because at the time telephone calls were really expensive).

And after that it was time for visitors…

Always very interesting people from different fields and parts of the world.

Four Roses bourbon times two…

After that I would go home and Brion took a nap.

Some time later on we met to go to clubs to have fun.

Especially The Privilege. This was a VIP club under a disco called The Palace. To get in you had to be creative. It was place to be…

All the cream of global creativity was gathered there … from Mick Jagger to Truman Capote.

My teacher was Maurice Benhamou, and he told me 20 years after that Brion was doing a full report on the subjects we discussed.

Mythology, religion, architecture… personal experiences…

He took the job very seriously.

In his book The Beat Hotel, Barry Miles says your father was a big influence on Gysin’s visual art. Did your father and Brion ever meet?

In 1977, two years after we met, Brion told me that he knew my father in New York, just after the war ... and they painted together in my father’s studio ... they met again in Rome in 1963...

Brion did a series of artworks titled ‘Gracias a Matta’ in 1963 ... I have one of them...

The main subject between Brion and my father was Ouspensky, because my father did work with him...

Brion Gysin, early 1980s.

Photographer: Ramuntcho Matta

From left to right:Yann Lecker, Ramuntcho Matta and Brion Gysin, early 1980s.

Did you know William Burroughs well or only slightly?

Of course. William very quickly became an uncle to me.

It was Brion who introduced me to him.

Also John Giorno, Allen Ginsberg, Ornette Coleman, Steve Lacy…

Another fascinating person from that era you were friends with was Ira Cohen. I guess you also met him through Gysin. There is a poem of Ira’s in which he mentions you, in connection with the suicide of the poet Gherasim Luca.

Well … Ira was a visitor of Brion… But I really became close to Ira after the passing of Brion.

He was living in my place in Paris every time he was town … sometimes for weeks …

We shared the same passion for magic and initiation processes.

Brion Gysin and Ira Cohen, early 1980s.

Photographer: Ramuntcho Matta

To go back in time a little, you studied music in New York in the late 1970s. You stayed at Laurie Anderson’s studio and met John Cage. What was that like?

Well, it was not exactly like that.

I had twin half-brothers.

Batan was an artist, a very good artist, but he had a problem with schizophrenia and he committed suicide in 1976 … that is when I met Felix Guattari and discovered la Borde… That is a mental health clinic. A very special place, not only for“sick” people but for anyone who felt disappointed by life.

His twin brother Gordon Matta-Clark was an artist too … and he died of cancer in 1978… The day after his passing, his best friend called me and said:

“Now that Gordon is dead, come to New York and I will be your brother.”

That was Richard Nonas.

So I went and the friends of Gordon adopted me.

Laurie Anderson was very friendly and we spent some time in her studio.

I became close to John Cage and watered his plants.

It was a great, great time with Robert Raushenberg, Robert Wilson, Dickie Landry, Richard Peck, Arto Lindsay…

I was going to the Third Street Music School.

After two years I came back to France to go back to Brion and take care of my mother.

And because I did not want to start a career.

When did your first music album come out, and how did that happen?

It came out in 1984. We did a concert with Brion in Paris and after the gig two men came backstage and said that they really enjoyed what we did.

They asked me what I would like the most. I said to make a record. One of them asked: “How much would it cost?”

I said 300 000 francs and one of the guys left.

He came back 10 minutes later with a paper bag with the money.

A few years before we had recorded Kick with Don Cherry with the money my father had given me to buy a car.

What musical instruments do you play apart from the guitar? I have seen footage of you playing the mbira – a present from Henri Michaux.

Well, “play” is a big word.

I fool around with anything that makes sounds.

Just name it… I can make a piece with it.

Also because I have synesthesia … so when I hear a sound, I see shape and colors.

You are a non-mainstream musician – you do not produce pop music. Is it difficult for non-mainstream musicians to get recognition in France?

It is impossible to get recognition, but I am not looking for it.

I just want to be a good human being and have great relationships with friends, animals, and
things.

I did have a hit song in the 80s so I achieved “success”, but I know it is misunderstood and it is not my cup of tea.

I am not a fighter; I am lover of life.

You are also an accomplished visual art, which I suppose is not a surprise considering your father was an artist. When did you start making art? Have you had any formal art training?

Well well well … I spent a lot of time in the studio of my father.

I spent a lot of time with Gordon and Batan.

I started to draw when I was 5 or 6, with Saul Steinberg.

I remember messing around with Asger Jorn.

I took drugs with Henri Michaux

and had great times with Brion over 10 years...

is that formal training ???

You make small watercolor paintings every morning, and share them on social media, always accompanied by poems or poetic texts. Is this daily practice like a form of yoga or meditation for you?

Yes, it is a meditation in action.

It helps me train my brain to find a lot of different paths with the infra self.

It is also a way to humanise the digital and to send “letters” to my friends.

I started almost 20 years ago.

You have also published several books – some of them are books of drawings, but also texts, such as Bonjour Bonjour, about Burroughs. Can you tell us more about your books? How many have you had published?

I have no idea.

I am like a dog.

If you ask me to do something, I will do my best.

I love to make records.

I love to make books.

As you know

because you are an artist

It is a very very lonely practice, and nobody asks you to do anything.

So every time there is an opportunity, I go.

I have made T-shirts, sound design, scenography for museums, CD-ROMs for children.

Your visual art has been exhibited in several countries, ranging from Italy to Argentina. Has there been an exhibition of your art that is a favorite for you?

Well, I love the time of the conception of an exhibition.

Because my exhibitions are the traces of an experience that I make specially for the place.

Most of the time I create relationships with the people that live in the area … schools, mental institutions, social networks…

The thing I like the most is sharing the present with people.

You have said that through your father you have had links to the surrealists and through Gysin links to the beats. What are your thoughts about these two groups, in the year 2026?

I believe in energy and the power of intention.

The surrealist group was a reaction to the First World War: saying never again, we have to create new tools to redefine the future.

The beats were a reaction against the American way of life.

Now it is important to invent tools of resistance…

I know exactly what the world needs, and I am working on it.

Apart from your daily watercolours, do you have any projects that you are now busy with?

Having a life is a good project.

I am working on a film about my mother.

I am working on an installation with the material that Chris Marker gave me before he died.

I do a lot of workshops

and I am working on making my phone ring.

Do you believe that artists or writers or musicians have a role to play in the world? If so, what would you say that role is?

My practice is not working in the art world

I do my art in neurosciences, education…

I generate situations.

I believe the arts are a perfect way in which to expand human capacities to explore the sensitive universe. My experiences have taught me that a certain level of art is an activator of a better being.

Art is a “presence” that expresses the essence of life.

We all need a good dose of this.

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