MATISSE, Henri (Cateau-Cambrésis, 1869 – Nice, 1954)
An example of extraordinary versatility, Henri Émile Benoît Matisse distinguished himself in a variety of art forms, including painting, printmaking, sculpture, decorative arts, scenography and writing. Initially committed to a legal career, Henri Matisse made a radical shift in 1891 and moved to Paris where he undertook his artistic training. As an aspiring artist he first attempted to prepare his admission to the École des Beaux-Arts under the academic guidance of Adolphe-William Bouguereau. In 1892, notwithstanding his failure to be accepted, Matisse was encouraged by the symbolist painter Gustave Moreau to attend his classes. While serving his painting apprenticeship Matisse studied at the École des Arts Décoratifs where he met Albert Marquet (1892–1894). In 1895 the artist officially became part of Moreau’s studio and was accepted at the École where he remained until 1899. In 1896 and 1897 Matisse exhibited at the Salon. After a previous unofficial relationship from which his first daughter Marguerite was born (1894), Matisse married Amélie Parayre in 1898 who gave him two other children, Jean (born 1899) and Pierre (born 1900). In 1901 Matisse exhibited ten works at the Salon des Indépendants and later met Maurice de Vlaminck at a Van Gogh retrospective organised by the Parisian gallery Bernheim-Jeune. The hybrid fervour that characterised the Parisian artistic milieu at the turn of the century was the enviromment which defined Matisse’s personal path and gave him the instruments to overcome the neo-Impressionist mode. Matisse fully assimilated the chromatic and spatial innovations carried out by Van Gogh, Gauguin and Cézanne and was deeply impressed by the Oriental designs that he had discovered at
the exhibition staged by the École des Arts Décoratifs in 1903. After a summer spent in Collioure with Derain where they experimented with the force of pure colour in rendering forms, Matisse exhibited at the Salon d’Automne of 1905. His works, among which stand out The Green Stripe (Madame Matisse) (Copenhagen, Royal Museum of Fine Arts), were displayed jointly with those of Vlaminck, Marquet, Camoin and Manguin. The group caused a real sensation amidst both public and critics as testified by the stage name that Louis Vauxcelles coined for them: The Fauves. On that occasion Gertrude and Leo Stein acquired his Woman with a Hat (private collection). In March the following year Matisse presented a unique pieces The Joy of Life, which was regarded as the artistic manifest of Fauvism (1905–1907). Thereafter, Matisse progressively improved his professional situation. The artist began to be increasingly
in demand and encouraged by galleries and collectors, which led to the creation his proper art academy: The Académie Matisse (1909–1911). His art started to be appreciated and requested abroad as demonstrated by the 1910 acquisition of three drawings by the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York). In 1909 the Russian collector Sergej Shchukin commissioned him the decoration of his Moscow residence for which Matisse conceived the two large panels known as The Dance and The Music (St. Petersburg, The Hermitage). In 1910 he aftended for the first time a performance of the Ballets Russes that staged Shéhérazade and was charmed by the exotic scenographies of Léon Bakst. In 1919 he realized the décors and the costume designs for Le Chant du Rossignol, presented in London, and repeated the experience some years later for Massine’s Rouge et Noir (1937). Between 1910 and 1913 Matisse travelled to Italy and Morocco. By that time the artist had not only established a personal language built upon an extremely elaborate vocabulary but had also diversified his production through other art forms such as ceramics, lithography and sculpture. In 1917 Matisse moved to Nice where he exhibited the following year together with Picasso at the Galerie Paul Guillaume. During the 1920s, Matisse’s works were exhibited in New York, Berlin, London and Paris. In 1930, overwhelmed by a depression, the artist spent three months in Tahiti and in Autumn travelled to the United States, for the Carnegie International had elected him as member of the jury. There Matisse had the opportunity to visit
a number of collections that featured his works and by the same token he was commissioned by the Barnes Foundation (Merion, Pennsylvania)
a series of mural decorations. In 1931 The New York Museum of Modern Art staged him a solo exhibition of his works and in 1932 his first work as a book illustrator was published: Poésies de Stéphane Mallarmé (Skira Edition) and was followed by many others. During the war Matisse remained in Nice although he had obtained a passage for Brazil and the following year he underwent surgery that confined him to a wheelchair for the rest of life. In 1943 the bombing of Cimiez forced him to move to Vence at the Villa Rêve where he eagerly worked on the pasted paper compositions called Circus,
at first, and Jazz, eventually. Between 1945 and 1953 a number of international as well as national museums and foundations such as the Victoria and Albert Museum (London) and the Museum of Modern Art (New York) held a series of retrospectives of his works. Matisse died the 3 November 1954 in Nice and was buried in Cimiez.
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