The Dream by Henri Matisse

 

I've wittered on about Matisse before here – almost 8 years ago!  But I was leafing through a book called Matise in 50 Works by John Cauman when my eye was caught by this work – I haven't noticed it particularly before.

 

Matisse created this work in 1940 – during the Second World War.   He was feeling stressed and wrote to his son that 'When I began it ,months ago, The Dream was a very realistic picture, with a beautiful dark young woman asleep on my marble table… Now she has turned into an angel… I won't say that this painting made me forget everything else, but at least it brought me some relief.'

 

The sitter (or is it sleeper) is wearing a Romanian peasant blouse.  The patterns intereact with the way he has drawn her features – and the table.  Striking!

 

This work is owned privately but going by previous sales it is most probably worth many millions.

Matisse

Matisse (1869 – 1954) was one of a group of young painters who exhibited in Paris who were known as "Les Fauves" which loosely translated means "the Wild Ones".  Matisse's work was hugely influential not just in art but in design generally.  But in his day he was once almost universally reviled and ridiculed.  He ignored the criticism and just went on innovating.  Because he didn't bother to answer his critics he was to suffer badly from unfounded scandal mongering.

Matisse's use of colour is spectacular – bold and vibrant.

While this great picture is called The Conversation, we can see that this couple is not getting on.  It must have been a difficult conversation.

Towards the end of Matisse's life when he was too wake to stand at an easel, he created paper cuts – cutting out shapes in paper and making collages with them.  These works look modern even now.

If you are interested in knowing more about Matisse, I can recommend the biography Matisse the Master by Hilary Spurling – in particular Volume 2.  

MOMA – New York

MOMA in New York is my second most favourite gallery – second to the Musée d’Orsay.  MOMA stands for the Museum of Modern Art. 

It houses over 150,000 artworks – so it is clearly impossible to take it all in.  There are some massive Monet Water Lilies – which have to be seen in person – you just don’t get the same impression in a small reproduction.  Some of the other most striking art from my point of view is:

Joan Miro - Hirondelle Amour

Picasso - Girl Before a Mirror

Matisse - La Danse

Van Gogh - Starry Night



Jasper Johns - Flag

Kandinsky - Painting No 200

Paul Klee - Two Tents

Mondrian - A Composition

It also has a great store where you can buy a huge range of prints and modernistic gadgets like a super iPad stand.  They do have an online site although it seemed a bit unstable when I tried it recently.