Ioan MATIUŢ
Born on December the 18th 1956, in Chisineu Cris, Arad County, Romania.
Chief Editor of Arca cultural magasine.
Member of Romanian Writers Union.
Funding member of COPYRO.
Editor at InfoTV television station
Chief Editor of Monitorul Cultural magasine
Manager of Mirador publishing house.
Adress:
27th Vasile Conta Street, Arad, zip 310307
e-mail: miradorul@yahoo.com
Phone. 0744-568884
Published books :
pillars of salt, Mirador publishing house (1996)
shadows, Mirador publishing house (1999)
sights, Mirador publishing house (2003)
déjà vu, collection „The Poets of the City" Dacia publishing house (2005)
between heavens, Brumar publishing house (2009)
Present in the anthologies :
7 Romanian Poets – 7 English Poets, today ( bilingual anthology, Romanian- English), Arca Magasine collection ( 1998); A Today's Anthology of Arad Literature, Mirador publishing house (2000); The Boat – House, bilingual anthology,Romanian- Hungarian, Mirador publishing house (2003).
Literary Prises:
- Prise for debut received from Romanian Writers Union, Arad subsidiaty. (1997)
- Prise for debut received from Romanian Writers Union, Arad subsidiaty. (2004)
- The prise for poetry at „Emia" International Festival of Poetry, Deva (2005)
- The prise „The Author of the Year 2005" for déjà vu book. Free Press Association and Romanian Publishing Houses (APLER) (2006)
- The prise received from Arad County Hall for déjà vu book (2006)
-„Excellency Diploma” - „Vasile Goldiş” University Arad (2006)
-Prise for poetry at “Convorbiri literare” magazine's days (2010)
Literary References (selectively) :
Ion Roşioru ( Tomis, no 12-1997), Florin Bănescu ( Curierul Aradului, no.8-1997), Gheorghe Mocuţa ( Arca, no.4,5,6-1997), Virgil Mihaiu ( Steaua, no. 11,12-1998), Lazăr Faur ( Semne, no.5-200), Pertu M.Haş ( Adevărul, no 2923-2000), Ada D. Cruceanu ( Semenicul, no. 1,2/ 1998), Iv Martinovici ( Observator de Munchen, no 1,2-2000), Ela Iakab ( Reflex, no.4,5,6-2005), Gheorghe Secheşan ( Arca, no 7,8,9-2005), Vali Crăciun, ( Porto Franco no. 4,5,6 – 2006)
Here is the intinerary of a consciousness living her drama of not being capable of freeing herself of the Evil except through self sacrifice, her bearer becoming, in his huge loneliness, the sign of passing towards a Good never to be touched completely, always suspended in his aspiration conceived aseptically. The poet pleads implicitly for the abolition of average perspectives fossilised by didactic tradition or the lasiness of common sense and instigates the overturn of convention recognised by continous use.
(Ion Roşioru – Tomis no. 12 – 1997)
On his path, the author will be having revelations, will be hoarding new knowledges, will be amased by unespected appearances, methamorphoses and even nonthingnesses of things known for a long time. It's only his this way, conscious that : „untill the end/ there are other opinions too". His rare boldness helps him in his difficult attempt.
( Florin Bănescu – Muşchetarii câmpiei de vest ( The West Plain's Muscheteers), Ivan Krasko publishing house, 2000)
The same as Lot who could have survived to Sodom and Gomorra, same as Orpheus whom gods have allowed to visit the land of the dead, the poet is a privileged being, a Pillar-man, a bearer of the mystery of Christian rite, but being at the same time a man under the influence of temptation and seduction.
Against any appearance or any possible interpretation, Ioan Matiuţ (The Pillar-man) doesn't write neither a religious poetry nor a mystical one. The gnomic expression, the discrete love of beauty with closeness and connections on the sensibility plan, the sober and austere notation are, by now, some of his style qualities, seemingly off an initiated ritual.
(Gheorghe Mocuţa – Arca no.4,5,6, - 1997)
The area of the poetry remains the area of regained innocence. An innocence often increased until devoutness. The perennial feelings of the living place themselves, this way, in a sacred perspective, although the religious perspective is never explicit, ostentatious.
These Pillars of Salt can be interpreted (also) like the response of a meditative temper, introverted in front of the aggressiveness and aplomb that surrounds us, embittering our existence.
(Virgil Mihaiu – Steaua no. 11,12 – 1998)
The conceptual universe of Ioan Matiuţ refers to a painful way to the human existential condition, searched out through the vision of a self used in an illustrative meaning and not an egocentric way – look/it pass through/myself like thorough a/ world – leaving space to troubling conclusions.
All poems are in-depth outbursts, polished in time in order to obtain the most accordant profile with the exposed idea, provoking an unusual restlessness which continues itself in a receptor's personal inner echo.
(Lazăr Faur – Semne no.5 – 2000)
A certain modesty which mustn't be read as an impoverished lyrical expression, a modesty doubled in overtones, by the hidden ego of the individual which has the quality of being a privileged creature by The Creation Author, meets us in Ioan Matiuţ lyrics. The poet thus feels, sometimes, the calling of talking with God.
Without questioning the poet's belief taking in account that will is universal, a question subsists: Who is the one that wants the author's eye to see what it sees? The Devil also wants many things.
(Petru M. Haş – Adevărul no.2923 – 2000)
In fundamental lines, the poetic vision of Ioan Matiuţ from priviri (sights), translates the human being's oscillation between life as a slow sliding towards the nothingness and death as a revealing experience.
(Ela Iakab, Reflex, no.4,5,6-2005)
It may be possible that the downs of this kind of poetry to come exactly from its merits. If the 80's poet likes ( much) to hear himself talking (namely writing), Ioan Matiuţ writes lyrical short texts, brought to essential, full of poetical tension, almost like haikus. It can be easily seen that they are chiseled, polished, thought out, and not "found", rumpled, in a broken pocket of his soul ( as it happens to other poets)
Their shortness could damage the poetical magic, which for me it seems to be one of the essential quality of Ioan Matiuţ poetry.
Finally, his poetry is remarkable and to be remarked, exactly because he doesn't take in account the 80's poetical ordeal (to the extent of its existence, of course).
(Gheorghe Secheşan, Arca no. 7, 8, 9, - 2005)
Ioan Matiuţ poems are as much as they have to be. It is very difficult, you need the hand of a Master to be capable, in a few words, to transmit even feelings. Not only spiritual scintillation; these scintilations have sometimes melancolical loads, other times ironical loads, a filigree jeweler's work.
A poetry without a to big sonorousness when readed, at loud voice reading, but it succeds to make an implosion. It is not an outer performance, it gets inside you and without asking for effort provokes hapinnes.
A poet that i envy for almost every poem of his book. To write arid, to put the thought above the text is a sign of poetical maturity.
(Ion Mureşan cover IV déjà vu )
Ioan Matiuţ lyric is cerebral, seduced my the maximal condensation of ideas. Many poems are thoughts-sentences, marked elliptical communication, not necessary the kind of equivoque of symbolist type, but more by the living's abstraction. The artists' analytical operation belongs to the artist who is convinced that language and sight ( the inner image of the world) are vulnerable. They become instruments which distort perception, the quality of existence, estranges from the truth, which is relative anyway.
It is the step towards essence, through acknowledgement of the limit, a need of receiving the spiritual energy through another kind of sight, without the physical eye. Revelation isolates, projecting in another plan, segregates the self from its identity.
(Vali Crăciun, Porto Franco no. 4,5,6 – 2006)