Mid-Century Mathieu Mategot "Casablanca" Bench, circa 1950, France

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Mid-Century Mathieu Mategot "Casablanca" Bench, circa 1950, France

About the Item

Mathieu Matégot bench. Made with perforated iron. Lacquered in black. Circa 1950, France. Very good vintage condition. Mathieu Matégot (1910 - 2001) was a versatile, independent and self-taught Hungarian designer, architect and artist who spent most of his life in his beloved Paris, where he for the first time settled in 1931 after finishing his studies at Budapest's School of Art and Architecture. In the 1950's - and for a decade and a half - that he devoted to the design of furniture and interior accessories, he created a wide range of distinctive designs that today is considered iconic and contemporary. To ensure quality in the production of his own designs, Matégot set up two of his own workshops - Société Mategot, one in Paris that employed up to twenty workers and a second in Casablanca, Morocco. Both manufactured in limited numbers for up to 400 items and continued until the beginning of 1960's when Matégot abruptly ended his production and began his work on tapestry, which he would continue for the rest of his career. Mid-Century Modern (MCM) is a design movement in interior, product, graphic design, architecture, and urban development that was popular from roughly 1945 to 1969, during the post–World War II period. The term was used descriptively as early as the mid-1950s and was defined as a design movement by Cara Greenberg in her 1984 book Mid-Century Modern: Furniture of the 1950s. It is now recognized by scholars and museums worldwide as a significant design movement. The MCM design aesthetic is modern in style and construction, aligned with the Modernist movement of the period. It is typically characterized by clean, simple lines and honest use of materials, and it generally does not include decorative embellishments.

Creator:
Mathieu Matégot (Designer)
Dimensions:
Height: 31.49 in (79.99 cm)Width: 46.85 in (119 cm)Depth: 20.86 in (52.99 cm)Seat Height: 17.32 in (44 cm)
Style:
Mid-Century Modern (Of the Period)
Materials and Techniques:
Iron,Lacquered
Place of Origin:
France
Period:
Mid-20th Century
Date of Manufacture:
1950
Condition:
Wear consistent with age and use. Very Good Vintage Condition.
Seller Location:
Girona, ES
Reference Number:
1stDibs: LU952636203682

Shop All Mathieu Matégot

Mathieu Matégot

With their curvaceous metal surfaces and shapes often resembling sheets of folded paper, Mathieu Matégot's inspiring furniture and lighting designs are easily recognizable and highly sought after by collectors. By working with perforated sheet metal and metal tubing, the Hungarian-born French architect, artist and designer — who is known by aficionados for his “rigitulle” technique — created tables, chairs and decorative objects that are celebrated works of French modernism and make a statement in any interior.

Matégot attended the Budapest School of Fine Arts and Architecture. He graduated in 1929 and traveled before settling in Paris in 1931, where he worked as a window dresser for department stores and as a set designer for cabaret halls.

In 1939, Matégot joined the French army in resistance to invading Nazi forces. He was soon captured and sent to work in a German factory. It was at this factory where Matégot became familiar with the materials and techniques that would inform and inspire his trademark rigitulle method.

After the war ended, Matégot opened a workshop in Paris and began to create handcrafted furniture that didn't conform to established styles of the time. Matégot explored merging traditional and non-traditional materials — he worked with formica, glass and natural materials such as rattan — and engaged in other forward-looking experiments. Matégot soon patented his career-defining rigitulle technique and material, which saw the designer working with metal tubing and perforated metal sheets and producing thin, airy folds into the metal as if he were manipulating fabric or paper.

Many of Matégot’s designs for table lamps, pendants, tables and more are reflective of the rigitulle technique, but the best-known work that exemplifies this process is his elegant three-legged Nagasaki chair, which he exhibited in 1954 at the Salon des Artistes Décorateurs. The original Nagasaki chair gave way to a collection that included a stool and an armchair. Matégot’s Nagasaki dining chair has been reissued by Gubi and is part of the permanent collection at the Vitra Design Museum, which is home to one of the world’s most important furniture collections.

Matégot created a range of smaller items for the home — serveware, side tables and magazine racks, each distinctive in their fluid and organic forms — but halted his career in design and moved to Angers in the early 1960s in order to turn to creating art. Today he is known for his abstract tapestries as well as his furnishings.

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