The Mediterranean has always fascinated Matisse, from his first visit to Corsica in 1898 to his frequent visits to Nice on the Mediterranean between 1917 and 1954, as well as many trips to Italy and Morocco. The natural scenery and brilliant colors of the Cote d'Azur brought endless inspiration to Matisse's creations.
"Matisse's Mediterranean" is currently on display at the Matisse Museum in Nice, France. The exhibition presents more than 150 works. Through the perspective of the Mediterranean and its iconic locations in these paintings, viewers can re-examine Matisse's works and explore the connection between Matisse and this civilized region.
The Musée Matisse is located in the olive groves of the Cimière Gardens in Nice, France. Formerly a 17th-century Genoese villa, its facade features illusionist decorations. Located near the ruins of the Roman Colosseum and the olive grove, the museum forms a fusion of art and history. The collection systematically charts the artistic development of Fauvist painter Henri Matisse from his settlement in Nice in 1917 until his death in 1954. It includes 236 paintings, 218 prints, and masterpieces such as "Blue Nude No. 4" and "Still Life with Pomegranates." A special exhibition focusing on Matisse and the Mediterranean is currently on view at the Musée Matisse.
Matisse Museum
Matisse Museum
Matisse himself admitted to being struck by the radiance of the Mediterranean basin, and basking in it had a decisive influence on his work, not only because this environment allowed him to experiment with a new language, but also because of the pictorial traditions it connected him to; more importantly, the connections the Mediterranean evoked with the Orient and ancient cultures. While expressing his personal perception of landscape, Matisse maintained a conceptual connection to the sea, and the Mediterranean in particular: the sea is composed of spaces that people have lived, felt, dreamed, or fantasized about.
Embracing the azure sea and vibrant sunshine along France's Mediterranean coast, Matisse was captivated by what he witnessed, developing a new painting technique here. He applied vibrant, intense colors to the canvas, unburdened by reality, freely expressing his inner sensibility. This exhibition, featuring sections such as "Bathers and the Pastoral Coast," "Matisse's Mediterranean Artistic Route," "Windows and Studio in Nice," and "Mediterranean Herbarium," explores the connection between Matisse's work and the Mediterranean from multiple perspectives.
Bathers and idyllic coast
Although rarely considered a landscape painter, Matisse incorporated the Mediterranean into his work from an early age, his paintings going beyond simple depictions of the Mediterranean coastline to explore the sensitive and symbolic dimensions of the region. The subject of the bather, closely linked to the marine world, occupies a central position in his work. By re-examining traditions inherited from the Renaissance and drawing on diverse influences such as Giotto, Cézanne, and non-Western art, Matisse reimagined the image of the bather between mythology and the modern era.
Bathers and Tortoises, 1907-1908, oil on canvas, Saint Louis Art Museum
Bathing with a Turtle is one of his most ambitious works of the 20th century, embodying a fusion of the ancient and the avant-garde.
Luxury, Tranquility and Pleasure, 1904, oil on canvas, Musee d'Orsay, Paris (on loan from the Centre Pompidou)
Luxe, calme et volupt (Luxury, Serenity and Pleasure) depicts Henri Matisse's work in Saint-Tropez during the summer of 1904, while working with Paul Signac. Signac taught him the theories of Neo-Impressionism. Matisse experimented with the divided brushstroke, a visual technique that enhances brightness and color contrast. However, the technique was not for him: he applied it less rigorously than initially, soon preferring flat areas of color, which would later form the genesis of Fauvism. Luxe, calme et volupté (Luxe, Calme et Volupt) explores themes of the Golden Age, a subject dear to Matisse, drawing on a rich legacy of past pictorial traditions, from the poetry of Ovid to Manet's "Luncheon on the Grass," from Paul Cézanne's "Bathers" to the Symbolist murals of Puvis de Chavannes.
Matisse's Mediterranean Art Route
From Corsica to Antibes, passing through Algeria, Spain, or Morocco, each Mediterranean journey brought profound changes to his painting: a liberation of color, a taste for decoration, and the abandonment of perspective. This artistic journey is traced from Henri Matisse's first honeymoon in Corsica with his wife to his arrival on the Côte d'Azur and his trip to Nice in 1917. The Mediterranean becomes a kind of interior landscape in Matisse's paintings, a joyful spiritual and sensory space where color vibrates like musical notes.
The Sea of Corsica, 1898, oil on canvas
Landscape of Saint-Tropez at Dusk, 1904, oil on cardboard
View of the Bay of Tangier, Grenoble Museum, 1912
Matisse painted "View of the Bay of Tangier" in late April 1912, during his first visit to Tangier. He appears to have completed the painting quickly, capturing his new surroundings with immediacy and enthusiasm. This landscape, one of the few he created in Morocco, was situate at a high point in the city, at the entrance to the Kasbah, on a terrace overlooking the medina. From this panoramic viewpoint, he immersed himself in the town while remaining detached from its bustling surroundings. Using pen and ink, he used sinuous, vivid lines to delineate the landscape's main elements and significant buildings, and managed to suggest the town's vibrant activity through figures shrouded in black and white. However, Matisse was not interested in the town's topography or architecture, but rather in conveying the intense, transparent light that permeated the landscape. In this work, Matisse successfully recreates the intensity of the light, as well as the soft, hazy, and translucent atmosphere he described in detail in his letters.
The Storm in Nice , 1919-1920, oil on canvas, Musee Matisse, Nice
Originally from the north, Henri Matisse traveled to the south of France to treat his bronchitis, drawn by the healing Mediterranean climate. He discovered Nice in late 1917 and lived in hotels during the winter months until 1921, settling on Nice's Cours Saleya. "The Storm in Nice," painted at the Hôtel de la Méditerranée in November 1918, depicts his first stay at the Hôtel Beau Rivage.
It had been raining constantly, and Matisse, frustrated by the bad weather, was about to leave, as evidenced by his self-portrait in the Matisse Museum, which shows the artist sitting at his easel in his hotel room, an umbrella behind him and a suitcase at his feet: "I left L'Estaque because of the wind, and then I came down with bronchitis there. I came to Nice to get rid of the bronchitis, and it rained for a whole month. Finally, I decided to leave the city. The next day, a northwest wind blew away the clouds, and the weather was magnificent." Matisse then noticed the brightness of the sea and sky: "When I realized that I would see this light again every morning, I could hardly believe my luck." "The Tempest in Nice" is one of the few works by the artist that depicts atmospheric scenes. Like Cézanne, he focused on depicting the permanence of things in his works.
Installation view of "Fête des fleurs" at the Cleveland Museum of Art in 1923.
The Côte d'Azur undoubtedly offered Matisse the perfect respite from the hardships of wartime life in the capital, but he initially found the town deserted and the weather gloomy. However, the sky gradually cleared, and the Mediterranean sunshine dazzled the artist. Between 1921 and 1923, Matisse created five paintings depicting the "Flower Wars," a parade of flower-adorned floats on the Promenade des Anglais. This spectacular event originated in the late 19th century, when Nice was the center of France's cornelian production, and is still celebrated during Nice's Carnival. In all five paintings, Matisse depicts his daughter Marguerite and his model, Henriette Darica, overlooking the Promenade des Anglais float parade from their hotel balcony. The balcony provides a quiet vantage point from which to observe the bustling scene of people, floats, and cars crisscrossing the canvas.
Windows and studios in Nice
In Nice, the window became a key element in Matisse's studio, symbolizing the passage between inside and outside. It emerged during the Fauvist period and reached its full development during the first period known as "Nice," where it captured the Mediterranean light and merged it with the studio. The extraordinary windows brought together in this exhibition allow us to demonstrate how Matisse unified his diverse spaces through light.
Violinist at the Window, 1918, oil on canvas, Centre Pompidou, Paris
The painting "The Violinist at the Window" was created during Matisse's first brief stay in Nice. The window is open to the azure sky, and the blue shutters, railings, and red tiles create a tricolor harmony in the apartment that Matisse rented as a studio while still living in the Hôtel Beau Rivage.
The silvery light of the painting is the central theme of the painting, which depicts a winter scene in Nice, a scene that Matisse often praised: "The light in Nice, especially in that beautiful period of January, with its richness and silvery clarity, seems to me a unique and indispensable element of the spirit of the visual artist."
Playing the violin was one of Matisse’s particular passions during those years, and it appears in several of the artist’s most important paintings from the same period. Thus, The Violinist at the Window can be seen as a covert self-portrait, a suggestive depiction of the artist as a violinist.
"Interior in Nice" 1917-1918 Philadelphia Museum of Art
In December 1917, Henri Matisse moved into the Hôtel Beau Rivage in Nice, intending it to be a short stay, as perhaps indicated by the unopened small brown leather suitcase on the table to his right. However, just a few years later, the artist established roots in Nice. He said it was the area's soft yet radiant light that drew him to the area for his lifelong work. In "Interior in Nice," this Mediterranean light illuminates the white lace curtains, the open windows, and the interior of the room. Matisse's depiction of his room as an illuminated box marked a larger shift in his artistic practice: a decades-long shift toward a relatively realistic depiction of light, form, and three-dimensional space.
Exhibition view: Nice, cahier noir, 1918, Kunstmuseum Winterthur
Installation view of Vase of Fleurs, 1924, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
The painting's mundane subject matter—a bouquet of flowers in a room facing the sea—belies the complexity of the relationships within. Although all elements are bathed in a soft Mediterranean sunlight, they each appear to react to it in their own unique way. Matisse was less interested in the uniqueness of an object than in capturing "the circumstances that created it."
Exhibition view Andalusian glass vase Matisse Museum
The Mediterranean Herbarium
Matisse's connection to nature was profound; landscapes, gardens, and plants were a constant source of inspiration. Sensitive to the rhythms and colors of plants, Matisse explored their organic structures, particularly through motifs such as orange, a motif that permeates his work from Tangier to Vence. His observations of Corsican vegetation, with its vibrant colors and lush gardens, nourished his vision. Matisse's herbarium, comprised of plants such as cacti, palms, cacti, and eucalyptus, found echoes in his paintings, drawings, and cutouts. In Nice, he rediscovered the essence of these exotic locales.
Exhibition view: Still Life with Oranges, 1912, Picasso Museum, Paris
Exhibition view: Still Life with Pomegranates, 1947, Matisse Museum
Exhibition view: The Blue Villa in Nice, 1918, oil on canvas