What I dream of is an art of balance, of purity and serenity... something like a good armchair which provides relaxation from physical fatigue.
Henri Matisse
Henri Matisse (1869–1954), one of the most influential artists of the twentieth century, transformed modern art through his revolutionary use of colour, line and composition. Originally trained as a lawyer, he turned to art at twenty-one and studied in Paris, absorbing a succession of artistic influences before developing his own distinctive visual language. His discovery of the light of southern France led to increasingly vivid colour and his emergence as a leading figure of Fauvism in 1905. His style continued to evolve through periods of decorative richness, geometric abstraction and experimentation with Cubism, before his move to Nice in 1917 inspired luminous interiors and paintings centred on the female figure. Working across painting, drawing, sculpture, printmaking and book illustration, Matisse continually sought an art of “balance, purity, and serenity”. From the 1940s, his paper cutouts became his principal medium, culminating in the Chapel of the Rosary at Vence (1948–51), an extraordinary synthesis of colour, form, architecture and design.
