Henri Matisse

Paper Summary:

This paper looks at the life of Henri Matisse, born in 1869 in the north of France. It explores how, unlike many artists of the turn of the century and during the two world wars, Matisse remained steadfast in his attention to the same subjects he had always painted: interiors; landscapes; and people. It shows how he never gave up his intense palette in favor of the muddy and neutralized colors favored by the disillusioned and discontent, despite the near-abstract qualities of his paintings in his later years.

From the Paper:

"In fact, there is very likely to have been a direct influence by Signac's work on Matisse's decision to paint Le Bonheur. In 1895, Signac had displayed the painting he regarded as his masterpiece at the Salon des Independants. The painting, In the Time of Harmony, was a large allegorical composition setting forth Signac's anarchist beliefs. (Hughes, date unknown) That sort of ideation and the subject matter needed to convey it would not have been appealing to Matisse, as apolitical as he was. But Matisse was interested in the concepts of Baudelaire, who attempted to reconcile the distressing portions of the "modern age" with an idealized antiquity."

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