The Rebellious Curator

Cutout (collage) by Henri Matisse (1869 - 1954)

Matisse was the leader of the Post-Impressionists - the painters working after the Impressionists. Also classified as an Early Expressionist, Matisse and his contemporaries, Gauguin and Van Gogh, painted their emotional reactions to the communities around them. This was a radical style which involved the use of very bright colours that had not been seen before. In 1905, a group of painters had a showing of their paintings at the Salon D' Automne in Paris. An art critic who saw the paintings thought they were the works of wild beasts. Hence, Matisse and the other artists who were exhibiting there, became known as the Fauvists, which in French, translates as "Wild Beasts". 

When Matisse was old, he fell ill and was confined to bed. He began to to create his paper cutout collages because it was difficult for him to paint at an easel. While in bed, he cut out interesting shapes from colourful paper then directed his studio assistant where to place them on the substrate. He called the shapes "positives" and the left-over paper cut-aways "negatives". He used both in his collages by organizing the shapes to create harmony with lines, shapes and patterns, a process never tried before.