Henri Matisse 1869-1954

“Expression, for me, does not reside in passions glowing in a human face or manifested by violent movement. The entire arrangement of my picture is

expressive; the place occupied by the figures, the empty spaces around them, the proportions, everything has its share.”

– Henri Matisse, 1908, Notes of a Painter

1906, Copenhagen

Early Career and Influences• Born in Cateau –Cambresis Northern France to parents who were shopkeepers• Trained in Law and worked as a clerk in a law firm from 1889-1891 while taking courses in tapestry and textile design• Abandoned law to the disapproval of his parents in 1891 to devote himself to art.• 1892 Enrolled in Bourguereau’s class at Academie Julien. • 1894 His daughter Marguerite was born to Caroline Joblaud• 1895 Spotted by Gustave Moreau and invited to join his course at Ecole Des Beaux Arts

Still life with Books First painting 1890

Wm. BourguereauWork Interrupted 1891

Gustave MoreauSymbolist painter 1826-1898

Jupiter and Semele1894-95

Early Career and Influences • 1897 first saw Impressionist

paintings at the exhibition of the Caillebotte bequest

• 1898 married Amelie Parayre, honeymooned in London where he saw Turner works.

• 1898 first sight of Signc’s work and that of Neo Impressionists

• Visited Corsica and South of France, influenced by dazzling

light• 1899 Birth of son Jean• Purchased work by Van Gogh and

Cezanne

Afternoon at the Grande Jatte Georges Seurat 1884-86

The Jetty at CassisPaul Signac 1889

Paul Cezanne Three Bathers 1879-82Purchased by Matisse because “The proportion of the handof the walking woman with respect to the composition as a whole”

Early Work“ I put figures in my still life”

The Dinner Table 1896-97

Early Work

Fruit and Coffeepot (1898), Dishes and Fruit (1901),

Early Work

Fruit and Coffeepot (1898), Dishes and Fruit (1901),

Signac’s Influence in St Tropez

Luxe, Calme et Volupté, 1904The Gulf at St Tropez 1904

With Andre Derain in Collioure Fauvism- “Wild animals with pure orgy of colour”

Woman with a Hat, 1905.“ to paint a human face as though it were a wild jarring patchwork of distinct yet equally intense compartments of colour”

Open window at Collioure, 1905« The atmosphere of the landscapeand my room are one and the same »

“Fauvism was a brief period during which we thought it necessary to exalt all colours together and sacrifice none of them”

View of Collioure ,1905

1906-1908A north African Venus

Blue Nude; In memory of Biskra, 1907

Two Women ,1907 Combines the way women are treated in African

and classical sculpture

Picasso and Matisse

Met around 1905 and were lifelong friends and rivals. Matisse introduced Picasso to the art of Africa. Matisse was Pablo Picasso's senior by twelve years, and the two men could not have been more different. Reserved and dignified, Matisse was the image of respectability. Aggressive and egotistical, Picasso considered himself superior to every person he ever met.

Nude with raised arms, Picasso, 1907

Matisse responds to Picasso

Bathers with a Turtle, 1908

Bathers with a Turtle 1908Matisse countered Picasso’s Cezanne inspired Cubism with these monumental compositions that

stress harmonious ,expressive body movementLe Luxe, 1907-08Decorative interpretation of Cezanne through Gauguin

Love of Decoration

Harmony in Red, 1908 The Red Studio, 1911

“By late 1907 Matisse’s work showed conflicting tendencies ; on the one hand , a decorativestyle with unmodulated fields of brilliant colour; on the other , a virtually achromatic ,volumetric approach”

Dance and Music 1909

• Painted for Sergey Ivanovich Shchukin a Russian collector of Matisse’s work

• Rejected at first because of their critical reception but later accepted

Bathers by a River 1909-1916“anxieties induced by impending war”

Sculpture

Night MichelangeloMarble, 1526-1533

Large seated Nude Matisse Bronze 1922-29

1919-1930“Painting as a source of undisturbed pleasure”

Reclining Odalisque 1927

The Moorish screen 1921

Barnes Commission

Dance 1931 (Mural)

Paper Cut Outs“Matisse's flat, abstracted forms and large areas of pure colour marked an important change in the direction

of his later work ”

Icarus from Jazz 1947Cover of Jazz, book of 100 prints 1947

Stencils

Pasiphae, Song of Minos 1944

Lino prints