Mati Klarwein (April 9, 1932 - March 7, 2002) was a painter, born in pre-war (WWII) Germany. His family was of Jewish origin and fled to Palestine when he was two years old. Klarwein grew up in Palestine and Israel but subsequently travelled widely and lived in many different countries. One of Klarwein's paintings, Annunciation (1961), was seen in reproduction by the musician Carlos Santana and subsequently used by his band Santana for the cover image of their second and best-regarded album Abraxas (1970). In the same years Klarwein produced comparably striking designs for the covers of two Miles Davis albums, Bitches Brew (1969) and Live-Evil (1971), as well as a powerful portrait of Jimi Hendrix. The association of his images with these very successful and widely admired countercultural musicians made Klarwein's work known outside the circle of lovers of contemporary art.
He is still best known for his art of the '60s and '70s, with its clear links to surrealism (Klarwein studied with the Viennese Fantastic Realist Ernst Fuchs), popular psychedelic imagery and religious art from a number of different traditions, but the artist also worked more conventionally across a variety of genres including still life, landscape and portrait.
