MATHIAS GOERITZ (Poland, 1915 - Mexico, 1990). Untitled. Gold paint and ink. Signed in the lower left corner. Size: 28 x 21 cm; 52 x 42 cm (frame). Mathias Goeritz spent his childhood in Berlin, where he began studying philosophy and art history in 1934 at the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Universität Berlin, now known as the Humboldt-Universität Berlin, Goeritz. He went on to earn a doctorate in art history from this institution in 1940. During the course of his studies, Goeritz also trained as an artist at the Kunstgewerbe- und Handwerkerschule in Berlin-Charlottenberg (applied arts and crafts school), where he studied drawing with the German artists Max Kaus and Hans Orlowski. After completing his doctorate, Goeritz worked at the Nationalgalerie in Berlin (National Gallery), now the Alte Nationalgalerie, under the supervision of the 19th-century art specialist Paul Ortwin Rave. In early 1941, in the midst of World War II, Goeritz left Germany and settled first in Tetouan, Morocco. He and the photographer Marianne Gast married in 1942, and the couple settled in Granada just after the war ended in 1945. Goeritz's career as a professional artist began with his first solo exhibition at the Librería-Galería Clan in Madrid in June 1946 under the pseudonym "Ma-Gó". The Goeritzes moved to Madrid in 1947 and there, Goeritz developed a close friendship with the Spanish sculptor Ángel Ferrant. In the summer of 1948, Goeritz and Ferrant travelled to visit the prehistoric paintings in the Altamira Cave in northern Spain, together with the writer Ricardo Gullón and other intellectuals of the time. It was then that Goeritz proposed the founding of an Altamira School in 1948, an association of artists and writers that would meet annually near the Cave. The Altamira School would eventually hold two meetings, in 1949 and 1950. Through the intervention of Mexican architect Ignacio Díaz Morales, Goeritz began to work in teaching. He taught art history to students at the newly founded School of Architecture in Guadalajara, Mexico in 1949. In 1953 he first presented his "Manifesto of Emotional Architecture" (Manifiesto de la Arquitectura Emocional. Architecture Manifesto) at the pre-inauguration of the Museo Experimental El Eco in Mexico City, which he designed in 1952-53. Goeritz also collaborated with Luis Barragán to make monumental abstract sculptures in reinforced concrete during the 1950s, including El animal del Pedregal (The Pedregal Animal, 1951) and Torres de la Ciudad Satélite (Satellite City Towers, 1957). Mathias Goeritz exhibited widely in Mexico and beyond throughout his life, and had a significant influence on younger Mexican artists such as Helen Escobedo and Pedro Friedeberg. He finally died in Mexico City on 4 August 1990.