(New York) In “l’Atelier rouge”, a canvas from 1911, Henri Matisse staged his paintings and sculptures, like a portrait of his art. One hundred and eleven years later, the MoMA in New York brings this work back to life, bringing together the works in the work for the first time.
Posted at 4:00 p.m.
At the center of this exhibition (1er May-September 10) of the Museum of Modern Art, there is therefore the Atelier rouge, a very imaginary representation of Henri Matisse’s studio in Issy-les-Moulineaux, in the Parisian suburbs, and an emblematic painting by an artist in the avant-garde, pioneer of bright colors, became one of the greatest painters of the XXand century.
The red, which invades the floor and the walls, was “so bold, at the time”, in 1911, underlines the chief curator of painting and sculpture of the MoMA, Ann Temkin.
All around, the museum brought together for the first time a very large part of the objects appearing in the painting: six paintings, two sculpted bronzes, a terracotta piece and a ceramic dish. They were made by Matisse between 1898 – he was 28 years old and barely graduated from the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris – and 1911, when the Russian industrialist and collector Sergueï Chtchoukine commissioned him.
” Treasure hunt ”
L’Atelier rouge is “in reality a portrait of his own life as an artist” at the time, argues Ann Temkin.
Thus, the visitor can admire the real “Corsica, courtyard of the mill” (1898), with impressionist inspirations, which appears in the Atelier rouge, placed almost negligently on the ground, or the “Nude with a white scarf” (1909) , full size.
In natural size, also appears The Young Sailor II (1906), colored portrait symbolizing the current of fauvism. The year preceding this work, at the Salon d’Automne in Paris, Matisse and others had drawn the wrath of critics, and the term “fauve”, in particular because of its explosive colors, sometimes unreal, as in The woman in the hat.
Out of ten exhibited works from the painting, two already belong to the MoMA, like the Red Workshop, three come from the National Gallery of Denmark, and the others have been gleaned from other museums and private collections.
“We went on a treasure hunt,” smiles Ann Temkin, for whom this type of exhibition provides a different perspective compared to a major retrospective.
“Let’s not overwhelm the public with ‘Oh, that’s a lot of art.’ Let’s invite them instead to get to know more fully what they are watching,” she defends.
Of the Atelier rouge paintings, one is missing, a large nude on a pink background. Matisse had asked for its destruction after his death, which occurred in 1954 in Nice, at the age of 84.
The exhibition also recounts the journey of the Atelier rouge, which was finally refused by Chtchoukine. The painting was bought in 1927 by a London high society meeting place, The Gargoyle club. MoMA acquired it in 1949.