Henri Matisse

Henri Matisse

31 December 1869 – 3 November 1954

He was a French artist, Known for his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsman ship.

He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known primarily as a painter.

Matisse is commonly viewed, along with Picasso and Marcel Duchamp, as one of the three artists who helped to define the revolutionary developments in the plastic arts in the opening decades of the 20th century.

Although he was initially labeled a Fauve (wild beast), by the 1920s he was increasingly known as an upholder of the classical tradition in French painting.

 

 

His mastery of the expressive language of colour and drawing, won him recognition as a leading figure in modern art.

 

He was a Fauve - Fauvist movement. - Active 1903-1908

Fauve is a title which means "wild beast." this group means wild beast. Because of the wild color, powerful, brutal brushwork, the term was derogatory. Whose work was characterised by bright and non-natural colors and simple forms (i.e. they painted objects not in the colors that they were, but the colors that the painters chose). E.g. Matisse painted his wife with a green stripe down her face.

 

Style: they combined the Expressionist painter’s high-key colors and emotional force with the Impressionist love of images of contemporary early 20thcentury life. They were not interested in symbolism subject matter but more in the act of painting, in their case the organization of color and form on a 2-dimensional surface. Their style of painting included slashing brush strokes and thickly outlined patches of color of the same tone.

Themes: portraits, still life, and landscape. Matisse also loved decorative pattern.

 

My oppinion:

His paintings are mostly in one dimension. The lines are simple, which reminds me of how Michael Craig Martin uses his lines. Matisse uses complimentary colours but his technique in painting is completely different from Michael Craig martin’s technique. His brushstrokes seem to be smooth which reminds me of the ancient Chinese paintings. The portrait painting sometimes seems distorted.

His landscape paintings however interest me. His bold brush strokes makes the painting seems sketchy yet detailed. He uses white spaces to create depth and perspective. The imperfections he created made the painting perfect in my eyes. It all comes together as one.

Painting

The dark colours in this painting was  known as Matisse's dark Period. This is the time when he was going through personal difficulties. One personal difficulty was that Matisse was not able to find many buyers for his works to support his family.

Metisse mainly uses the colour blue in this painting. The shades and tones of blue represents the afternoon atmosphere, but I also assume that  the colour reflects his emotion and feelings when he painted it.