Open Book

Paul Matthews’ portraits tell the tales of the characters who populate his life.

By: Ilene Dube
   There was a time in his life when Paul Matthews wanted to be a writer, and so he went to London for a year and a half with his new bride and tried the writing life on for size. But with a father who was editor at Time magazine, Mr. Matthews found too much criticism running through his head. So, instead, he found his voice as an artist and took a path that made all the difference.
   His paintings, completed over four-and-a-half-decades, tell many narratives. The patriarch of the tale is his father, a strong, domineering figure and a workaholic. In one of the paintings, the editor, wearing a starchy business suit, sits at his desk at Time while two naked people stand behind him — a sleepy-eyed little boy and a woman who looks as if she doesn’t know what to do next. These people are not just bereft of their clothing; their souls are exposed. "Anything to get his attention," says the tall, finely sculpted artist, now in his early 70s.
   Despite the neglect the son may have suffered, he clearly adores his father. In an essay to a catalog of his portrait work, Mr. Matthews writes: "… I sought him out, pursued him, courted him, attempted to know him, fight him, survive him, love him and, eventually, come to terms with him. I wanted to depict him as honestly as I could…"
   Finally, when the son painted the father at age 86, "I’d nailed him: his charm, his self-involvement, his enthusiasm, his handsome decadence."
   An exhibit at Riverrun Gallery in Lambertville in 2001 was devoted exclusively to the father, who was sent to London in 1953 to research the idea of a London bureau for the weekly newsmagazine.
   Born in Princeton, the younger Mr. Matthews lived here until he was 9 and the family moved to New York City. When Paul was 16, his mother died and he was left to live with his aunt and uncle Marjorie and "Buzz" Cuyler, in the Barracks on Edge Hill Street in Princeton. "It was just vacations and holidays," says Mr. Matthews, who attended boarding school in Connecticut at the time.
   While in London, the elder Mr. Matthews married Martha Gellhorn, a war correspondent and the third wife of Hemingway. That marriage lasted 10 years; it was Ms. Gellhorn’s third marriage, and Mr. Matthews went on to marry his third bride. One of Paul Matthews’ writing attempts had been a personal account of Hemingway.
   Mr. Matthews’ latest exhibit at Riverrun, Double Portraits, tells the stories of more recent events in his life, although threads from the past weave through. There are still signs of the writer in him: as he speaks, he self-edits, frequently wanting to change a phrase or deciding whether that part of the tale should be included at all.
   In Double Portraits, we see his four children — Tom, Harry, Hyla and Josh — and some former girlfriends ("I should stop painting them," he jokes. "It could be a jinx."), current wives, mothers nursing babies. Mr. Matthews’ subject matter can be shockingly intimate at times. At a retrospective of his work at the New Jersey State Museum in 2003, "Crowning" depicted a woman giving birth. She is completely naked on the operating table, pushing, while a man holds her from behind and a young woman in white coat and gloves assists from in front.
   "She is a very good friend and invited me to come and paint this," says Mr. Matthews, who was on location with a camera and a sketchpad — his M.O. — during the delivery.
   In another painting, "Vigil," we see this same woman, completely naked and full with her pregnancy, gazing out the window, while in the foreground is the artist’s father, looking wan, with a bandage around his head, most likely on his deathbed or possibly dead.
   "Vigil" is painted in a style Mr. Matthews often employs: The woman in the background is painted in full focus, almost photorealistically — we can see the blue veins in her breast. The father in the foreground is painted more loosely, as if unfinished. His interiors are always spare, minimalist, to put emphasis on the figures.
   On the wall is a painting of cumulous clouds. This is another theme that recurs in the artist’s work: crisply painted landscapes or open windows or doors that reveal an outdoor scene, a landscape in the wild. These landscape views hint at Mr. Matthews’ other life.
   During the half year he lives in Lambertville, Mr. Matthews mostly paints deep psychological portraits, but the other half year he lives in the Adirondacks and paints dramatic clouds and landscapes. A visitor to the Adirondacks seeing his work exhibited there might never guess that it’s the same artist who paints in Lambertville.
   And yet, upon closer study, it is the same artist. "See the symbolism here," says the artist, pointing to a phallus-shaped cloud. One can also see the undulating shapes of human figures in the rocks along the Ausable River.
   The nudes don’t sell as well, but he can’t paint the landscapes fast enough to keep up with demand. "Everyone wants a cloud painting," he says. "It’s still a challenge to do a good one, but I want to concentrate on figures in the time I have left.
   "Landscapes have an overpowering beauty, dauntingly so," he continues. "So, while tempting, it’s chutzpah to paint landscapes. I love doing the river ones; I always do them en plein air and it’s such a wonderful experience to be out there on the river, with no one else there besides the occasional fisherman. I think of the spot on the river I’ve painted over and over as my outside studio, with Mergansers or a heron flying right over my head. I may have seen sables — they look like otters — playing."
   Mr. Matthews has always been able to earn his living as an artist. As a student at Cooper Union, he earned highest honors and had his first one-person show at the Zabriskie Gallery in New York shortly after graduation. The home he shares with his wife, Lelia, an actress, was recently featured on the Lambertville Artists House Tour, but Mr. Matthews prefers not to disclose the "secret" location of his studio.
   Mr. Matthews continues to visit London at least once a year. His father’s third wife died recently, but his youngest child lives there and is musical director and drummer in Blue Man Group.
   Double Portraits is almost like a family album for Mr. Matthews. Not only do we see his immediate family members, but friends who are so close they are like family. There are paintings of his cousins visiting from Vermont whom he convinced to model for him on the New York City subway, a wedding portrait of a couple of artist friends he and his wife fixed up ("They really are right for each other and we knew it"), and his son Josh’s former girlfriend who has married and had five children. "Her baby girl was born on the day of the opening (of Double Portraits)," says Mr. Matthews, who goes to the ex-girlfriend’s mother for massage therapy.
   Mr. Matthews and his wife have four grandchildren. "It’s not enough; we’d like four more," he says unabashedly.
   In "The Telephone Call (Snow Day)," we see two lovers as she phones in to work to say, presumably, she won’t be making it in.
   "I totally subscribe to what Henri Cartier-Bresson described as ‘the decisive moment,’" he says. "That’s what I’m after."
Double Portraits — A Retrospective by Paul Matthews is on view at the Riverrun Gallery, 287 S. Main St., Lambertville, through May 31. Hours: Mon., Wed.-Fri. 10 a.m.-5 p.m., Sun. noon-5 p.m. For information, call (609) 397-3349.