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Video: What connected the great artists of the 20th century Matisse and Picasso
2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55
Henri Matisse (1869-1954) and Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) met in 1906 and followed each other's creative developments and achievements for more than half a century. The rivalry that arose between them not only spurred their individual successes, but also changed the course of contemporary art. Honest friendship and open rivalry between two masters of contemporary art, Matisse and Picasso, two of the greatest artists of the twentieth century. Does everyone know what really connected them?
Matisse: biography
Henri Matisse, who was 12 years older than Pablo, was born in the castle of Cambresi in 1869. Received a conservative upbringing in the north of France. Before Matisse found his calling, he studied legal law in Paris and worked as a staff clerk. But Matisse's world changed dramatically when, at the age of 20, his mother gave him a box of paints. Having discovered an extraordinary passion and talent for art, Matisse left his legal career and decided to study art in Paris. Already in 1901, Matisse became the leader of the newest artistic movement of the Fauves (in French "wild beasts"). Under the influence of the Post-Impressionists, solid forms and bright colors prevailed in Fauvism, which evoked intense and strong emotions and reflected abstract space.
Picasso: biography
Pablo was born in Malaga (Spain) in 1881. From childhood, Picasso grew up as a child prodigy, raised and supported by his creative family. In his youth, the young man moved to Paris to achieve fame and recognition in the capital of the art world. Picasso was inspired by the images of Edgar Degas and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (busy life inside cabarets, scenes of brothels and curious stories with women in a bar or laundry). But then came his "Blue Period", saturated with dark shades of blue. The themes of this period reflect the poverty that many people experienced during that difficult time.
A meeting
Matisse and Picasso met by chance at the Salon of the Stein brothers. It was dominated by an environment that most of all supported all the avant-gardes in the art world of the late 19th century. While young Pablo was working in real time on a portrait of Gertrude Stein, the sister of American brothers Leo and Michael, already an accomplished artist Matisse, watching him, literally pierced him with an inquisitive and silent look. Henri was very attracted by the strength and compositional confidence of the unknown young Picasso. By this time, Matisse had just founded the painting movement of the "Fauves" together with other artists of the same direction. Picasso, of course, knew about this and therefore jumped at the opportunity to organize this meeting in order to establish contact with the master.
Among the avant-gardes of art, Matisse was known as a gentle, calm and cultured person with good manners. But Picasso is completely different: a daring artist, proud of his successes and women (despite the fact that he remembered his apprenticeship and many closed doors in front of his face). Two completely different people. Perhaps that is why a deep friendship arose between them. These two often visited each other in all cultural environments, attracted each other with the same intensity with which they repelled. In 1907, Picasso painted The Maidens of Avignon, which is now in the Museum of Modern Art in New York. And he wrote it with the intention of demonstrating to Matisse his skill and creative originality.
And here an amazing and fateful life link takes place: looking at the work of Picasso, it was Matisse who invented the term "cube", which later reincarnated into "cubism", in which Picasso himself became a pioneer. The new pictorial vision destroyed the figure and color conceived up to that moment by Matisse.
What united them?
No one was more attentive and knowledgeable about the art of Matisse than Picasso, and vice versa. Both explored issues of space, movement, shape, color in figurative and abstract art, and then were inspired by each other's work to improve their art.
Their union was mutual awareness, recognition and creative union combined with a sense of rivalry. This artistic rivalry and collaboration marked the beginning of a new history of modernism. Despite the differences, both artists were united in their admiration for Paul Cézanne, who defied traditional one-point perspective by creating three-dimensional shapes on a two-dimensional plane.
Death of Matisse
In January 1941, 72-year-old Matisse underwent emergency surgery for colon cancer. This experience gave him a sense of rebirth. Unable to concentrate on painting, Matisse embarked on a new journey. He mastered a non-standard style in creativity, making paper cutouts, which he created right in a wheelchair or in bed.
In 1954, Matisse passed away. Picasso's reaction to his loss was peculiar and artistic. He wrote a series of works in memory of Matisse. In these paintings, Picasso adopted many of Matisse's favorite motifs - the odalisque, the open window overlooking the outside world, and Islamic decorative arts. Interestingly, shortly before his death, Matisse said to his colleague: “We must talk as much as possible,” Matisse once said. "When one of us dies, there will be objects that the other cannot talk about with anyone else."
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