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拍品专文
The paper cut-outs that Matisse executed during the last decade of his life are among the most significant creations of his entire oeuvre. John Elderfield has called these works "an irrefutably major flowering of Matisse's art...of such consummate authority that they can stand beside the best of his paintings" (The Cut-Outs of Henri Matisse, New York, 1978, p. 10). Between 1944 and 1954, Matisse focused on works from cut paper, ranging in size from whimsical miniatures to dramatic, room-sized creations. Some of these were independent compositions, while others (including the present work) served as design maquettes for an extraordinary variety of projects, including posters, magazine and catalogue covers, tapestries, rugs, liturgical vestments, stained glass windows, and ceramic tiles. Matisse viewed the cut-outs as a fitting culmination to his long career, synthesising ideas that had preoccupied him for nearly five decades. He commented in 1951, "From the Joie de vivre (I was thirty-five then) to this cut-out (I am now eighty-two)...I have searched for the same things... There is no break between my early pictures and my cut-outs, except that with greater completeness and abstraction, I have attained a form filtered to its essentials" (quoted in J. Flam, ed., Matisse on Art, Berkeley, 1995, pp. 207 and 209).
Matisse first experimented with cut paper in 1919, using it to make maquettes for the stage sets and costumes of Léonide Massine's ballet, Le chant du rossignol. He returned to the technique intermittently throughout the 1930s, most notably in the preparatory studies for the great Barnes mural and for a series of book, magazine, and exhibition catalogue covers based on cut-paper designs. An operation for abdominal cancer in 1941 left Matisse seriously weakened, and he increasingly turned to work in cut paper, which was less physically demanding than other media. He began with heavy white drawing paper, which he hand-painted with Linel-brand gouache; he then cut shapes from the paper with scissors, holding the blades wide open to produce a shearing effect. With the help of studio assistants, he pinned the paper fragments to his studio walls, rearranging them until he achieved the desired balance of forms and colours, and finally he glued the various elements to their support. After 1951, Matisse abandoned painting and sculpture altogether, and the paper cut-out became his sole vehicle for artistic expression. Despite his ill health, Matisse viewed this late period as one of intense creativity. He wrote to the painter Albert Marquet, "My terrible operation...has completely rejuvenated and made a philosopher of me. I had so completely prepared for my exit from life, that it seems to me that I am in a second life" (quoted in Henri Matisse Paper Cut-Outs, New York, 1977, p. 43).
The present cut-out was executed in 1951-1952; Elderfield has described 1952 as "one of the richest years of Matisse's career in the sheer number of important works produced... It was a year that synthesized many of the achievements of an entire career" (op. cit., p. 26). This example served as the maquette for the slipcase of Apollinaire, a book by André Rouveyre, published in Paris in 1952 as a tribute to their mutual friend, Guillaume Apollinaire. It was to the writer André Rouveyre, one of his closest friends and most frequent correspondents during the last years of his life, that Matisse explained, "The cut-out paper allows me to draw in colour. It is a simplification. Instead of drawing an outline and filling in the colour--in which case one modifies the other--I am drawing directly in colour, which will be the more measured as it will not be transposed. This simplification ensures an accuracy in the union of two means. It is not a starting point but a culmination" (quoted in exh. cat., op. cit., 1977, p. 17).
Matisse’s refined draftsmanship is prominently showcased in Apollinaire. Pencil underdrawings remain visible against the vibrant blue background, while delicate paper shards are layered over sections of the lettering to create subtle relief. Dotted across the cut-out, tiny pinholes reveal how meticulously Matisse experimented with composition, pinning and repinning elements as he tested layout possibilities. For the final mounting support, Matisse repurposed a leaf from his 1948 illustrated volume, Pierre de Ronsard’s Florilège des Amours. The reverse of the artwork thus reveals the opening stanza of Ronsard’s "Sonnet 101" (Morne de corps, et plus morne d'espris...). To complete the piece, Matisse folded the left margin of the page underneath and applied a vivid rectangle of yellow gouache along the spine, creating a striking contrast with the blue front. Through these intricate details and visible working marks, the artwork offers a rare, step-by-step glimpse into Matisse’s deliberate creative process.
Henri Matisse and André Rouveyre met in 1896 while studying under Gustave Moreau, sparking a lifelong friendship marked by extensive published correspondence and numerous collaborative projects. In contrast, Matisse’s connection with Guillaume Apollinaire was far more dynamic and intricate. Matisse likely first encountered the poet and emerging art critic in 1906 at Gertrude and Leo Stein’s Montparnasse apartment, a popular gathering spot for Pablo Picasso and other avant-garde figures associated with the Bateau-Lavoir and Montparnasse groups who reshaped early 20th-century Parisian art.The most striking feature of Matisse's cut-outs is their fusion of the expressive elements of painting, drawing, and sculpture within a single medium. In an interview with André Verdet in 1952, Matisse described his work in cut paper as "drawing with scissors on sheets of paper coloured in advance, one movement linking line with colour, contour with surface" (quoted in J. Flam, op. cit., p. 216), while in the text that he wrote to accompany the cut-paper folios of his illustrated book Jazz (1943-1944), he proclaimed, "Cutting straight into colour reminds me of the direct carving of sculptors" (quoted in ibid., p. 172).
Matisse first experimented with cut paper in 1919, using it to make maquettes for the stage sets and costumes of Léonide Massine's ballet, Le chant du rossignol. He returned to the technique intermittently throughout the 1930s, most notably in the preparatory studies for the great Barnes mural and for a series of book, magazine, and exhibition catalogue covers based on cut-paper designs. An operation for abdominal cancer in 1941 left Matisse seriously weakened, and he increasingly turned to work in cut paper, which was less physically demanding than other media. He began with heavy white drawing paper, which he hand-painted with Linel-brand gouache; he then cut shapes from the paper with scissors, holding the blades wide open to produce a shearing effect. With the help of studio assistants, he pinned the paper fragments to his studio walls, rearranging them until he achieved the desired balance of forms and colours, and finally he glued the various elements to their support. After 1951, Matisse abandoned painting and sculpture altogether, and the paper cut-out became his sole vehicle for artistic expression. Despite his ill health, Matisse viewed this late period as one of intense creativity. He wrote to the painter Albert Marquet, "My terrible operation...has completely rejuvenated and made a philosopher of me. I had so completely prepared for my exit from life, that it seems to me that I am in a second life" (quoted in Henri Matisse Paper Cut-Outs, New York, 1977, p. 43).
The present cut-out was executed in 1951-1952; Elderfield has described 1952 as "one of the richest years of Matisse's career in the sheer number of important works produced... It was a year that synthesized many of the achievements of an entire career" (op. cit., p. 26). This example served as the maquette for the slipcase of Apollinaire, a book by André Rouveyre, published in Paris in 1952 as a tribute to their mutual friend, Guillaume Apollinaire. It was to the writer André Rouveyre, one of his closest friends and most frequent correspondents during the last years of his life, that Matisse explained, "The cut-out paper allows me to draw in colour. It is a simplification. Instead of drawing an outline and filling in the colour--in which case one modifies the other--I am drawing directly in colour, which will be the more measured as it will not be transposed. This simplification ensures an accuracy in the union of two means. It is not a starting point but a culmination" (quoted in exh. cat., op. cit., 1977, p. 17).
Matisse’s refined draftsmanship is prominently showcased in Apollinaire. Pencil underdrawings remain visible against the vibrant blue background, while delicate paper shards are layered over sections of the lettering to create subtle relief. Dotted across the cut-out, tiny pinholes reveal how meticulously Matisse experimented with composition, pinning and repinning elements as he tested layout possibilities. For the final mounting support, Matisse repurposed a leaf from his 1948 illustrated volume, Pierre de Ronsard’s Florilège des Amours. The reverse of the artwork thus reveals the opening stanza of Ronsard’s "Sonnet 101" (Morne de corps, et plus morne d'espris...). To complete the piece, Matisse folded the left margin of the page underneath and applied a vivid rectangle of yellow gouache along the spine, creating a striking contrast with the blue front. Through these intricate details and visible working marks, the artwork offers a rare, step-by-step glimpse into Matisse’s deliberate creative process.
Henri Matisse and André Rouveyre met in 1896 while studying under Gustave Moreau, sparking a lifelong friendship marked by extensive published correspondence and numerous collaborative projects. In contrast, Matisse’s connection with Guillaume Apollinaire was far more dynamic and intricate. Matisse likely first encountered the poet and emerging art critic in 1906 at Gertrude and Leo Stein’s Montparnasse apartment, a popular gathering spot for Pablo Picasso and other avant-garde figures associated with the Bateau-Lavoir and Montparnasse groups who reshaped early 20th-century Parisian art.The most striking feature of Matisse's cut-outs is their fusion of the expressive elements of painting, drawing, and sculpture within a single medium. In an interview with André Verdet in 1952, Matisse described his work in cut paper as "drawing with scissors on sheets of paper coloured in advance, one movement linking line with colour, contour with surface" (quoted in J. Flam, op. cit., p. 216), while in the text that he wrote to accompany the cut-paper folios of his illustrated book Jazz (1943-1944), he proclaimed, "Cutting straight into colour reminds me of the direct carving of sculptors" (quoted in ibid., p. 172).