From an original paper cut by Matisse, and originally part of a large mural in his home.
One morning in the summer of 1952, Matisse told his studio assistant and secretary Lydia Delectorskaya that “he wanted to see divers,” so they set out to a favourite pool in Cannes. Suffering under the “blazing sun,” they returned home, where Matisse declared, “I will make myself my own pool.” He asked Delectorskaya to ring the walls of his dining room at the Hôtel Régina in Nice with a band of white paper, positioned just above the level of his head, breaking only at the windows and door at opposite ends of the room. The room itself was lined with tan burlap, a popular wall covering of the time. Matisse then cut his own divers, swimmers, and sea creatures out of paper painted in an ultramarine blue. The blue forms were pinned on the white paper, which helped define the aquatic ballet of bodies, splashing water, and light.
The result was Matisse’s first and only self-contained, site-specific cut-out. With its reduction of forms, its dynamic deployment of positives and negatives, and its lateral expansion across the walls,The Swimming Poolwas the culmination of Matisse’s work in cut paper up until that point. Matisse saw in paper’s pliability a perfect representation of the fluidity of water, makingThe Swimming Poola perfect melding of subject and means.
Published by Teriade for the 1958 special edition of Verve Magazine devoted to the last works of Matisse.
While suffering from ill health that prevented him from painting, Henri Matisse created his innovative, and bold gouache paper cut-outs.In 1953 he worked with the lithographer Fernand Mourlot and the art publisher Tériade to recreate the cut outs as lithographs. Matisse oversaw the first proof cut outs for the publication in 1954. However, he died in November 1954 before the magazine could be published. This special edition of Verve was eventually published in 1958 and became a tribute to Matisse. Entitled 'Dernières Oeuvres de Mattise 1950-54' (Last Works of Matisse). The publication featured forty original lithographs and several heliogravures, of which this is one. Henri Matisse was born 1869 in an industrial area of Northern France and almost accidentally stumbled into a career in art. Initially working as a legal clerk, he drew for pleasure in his spare time but he began to paint when he was recovering from an illness, and his career as a serious artist began. He moved to Paris shortly after where he was trained in classical painting but became aware of the art of Cezanne and Van Gogh who became influential figures in the development of his own artistic style. By the mid-1890s he was showing his works in large exhibitions and by the turn of the century, his style had become more progressive. A visit to St Tropez and later Coulloure, was the inspiration for him to infuse his works with light and bright colours. His work was more an abstracted realism, his human forms recognisable but altered.. A critic nicknamed Matisse a “Fauve” or “wildbeast”, because of the way he portrayed the human form, and the name Fauvism became the term used to describe the works of Matisse and some of his contemporaries.I n Matisse, it is characterised by the emphasis on the emotional power of sinuous lines, strong brushwork and bright colours, and he captures a mood rather than merely trying to depict reality. With his now defined style his success grew and he travelled extensively for inspiration. Following a permanent move to Nice, he created some of his most famous works, the Blue Nude pictures. Health issues resulted in surgery in 1941 and he was often bedridden. But this did not stop him from creating art. He devised means to paint or draw such as attaching pencils or brushes to long poles so that he could reach the canvas and his late works were as experimental and vibrant as his early works. His 1947 book, Jazz, showed a new approach in the use of paper cut-outs stuck to brightly coloured paper to create his art, a technique he used until his death in 1954.Spanning a 60 year career, his revolutionary use of brilliant colour and exaggeration of form to convey emotion makes him one of the most influential artists of the 20th century.
Minor staining to folds consistent with the age of the piece.
