Martins, Maria - Alberto Giacometti - Fernand Léger - Alexander Calder and others

Autograph letters signed by Alberto Giacometti (2; 5 pages), Alexander Calder (1; 2 pages), Fernand Léger (2 als, 3 postcards; 7 pages), Marc Chagall (1; one page), Jacques Lipchitz (2; 10 pages), André Masson (3; 4 pages), Jean Hélion (1, one page), Stanley W. Hayter (1 engraved original greeting card signed), and other... 
[With]: Amazonia by Maria. New York, Valentine Gallery, March 22, 1943. Copy #112/500. Catalogue of Maria Martins first exhibition in New York. This exhibition "Maria: New Sculptures and Mondrian: New paintings", showed works by Maria Martins and Pietr Mondrian. The copy comes with 14 photographs of the artist, her works, her workshop.

Lucia Maria Donnelley (Tarquínio de Souza), the artist's daughter. 

In 1939 Maria Martins and her second husband moved to Washington D.C. She met there with Jacques Lipchitz and the French Surrealist artist diaspora, including Breton, Duchamp, Masson, Léger, as well as American artists, like Calder. 
Her expressive, organic sculptures portrayed the natural forces and legends of Amazonia, and immediately attracted the attention and the recognition of the long established Surrealists.
In October 1941 Martins had her first solo exhibition, "Maria," at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. Nelson Rockefeller acquired a jacaranda wood sculpture for MOMA from that exhibition. In 1943, the Valentine Gallery in New York presented the exhibition, Maria: New Sculptures and Mondrian: New paintings. Martin exhibited her Amazon series in this exhibition.
Lipchitz, her teacher for a few years, writes her a nice compliment about her improvement on working with wax and his astonishment at the 1943 Valentine exhibition: "Je distingue dans votre oeuvre une aspiration à cristaliser, à solidifier les incarnations parfumées de la sève genereuse de votre forêt vierge natale. Ambition ardue et combien juste! De cette façon, vous apportez dans le trésor commun de l'humanité votre mot à vous et qui ne peut être dit que par vous". In the second letter, he tells her about Leib Jaffe and Israel. "Sandy" Calder, while inviting her in his country house thanks her for her exhibition: "I'm afraid I never thanked you for revealing the secrets of the Amazon to me". 
In 1947, her works are shown at the Exposition Internationale du Surréalisme in Paris. Alberto Giacometti meets her there. He writes to her about his inspiration issues: "J'ai passé le temps à faire et défaire mes sculptures et seulement maintenant elles commencent à aller mieux (...) J'essaie souvent à faire la peinture mais là je ne suis pas encore très loin". In 1948, Giacometti thanks her for her letter and a catalogue. He did some drawings for his upcoming exhibition, but he cannot wait to return to work on his sculptures: "J'ai fait des dessins pour mon exposition mais je suis impatient de reprendre la sculpture. Pourtant il fallait bien quitter pour un peu cet atelier et ce plâtre et penser à autre chose."
In an early letter, André Masson writes about the Surrealism exhibition "First Papers of Surrealism", organized by Marcel Duchamp: "Une grande exposition Surrealiste (très large puisqu'elle comporte des oeuvres de Picasso et de Chagall) doit s'ouvrir à New York (...) Cette exposition est "mise en scène" par Marcel Duchamp, alors ce sera peut-etre une ... mise en pièces!".