The Oasis of Matisse

Interesting exhibition at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam looking at the development of Matisse’s artistic practice with an emphasis on the cut outs of his later years.

What was interesting was that I had seen the Matisse cut outs exhibition at Tate Modern last year so it was really good to see how the works were displayed by another museum and put in a different context.

The ground floor of the show looked at works by Matisse in dialogue with work from work from the museums own collection and how the cut outs developed from this. This gave the opportunity to see works I didn’t know and to get an oversight of the gallery’s collection. I loved the room on the odalisques which places a Matisse’s with a Picasso and a sculpture by Laurens. It was also interesting to see a Matisse costume for a Diaghilev ballet.

Upstairs gave space to some of the large cut out works including “Polynesia, the sea” and “Polynesia, the sky” from 1946. There was a lovely display of chasubles made for the Chapel of the Rosary in Vence alongside the drawings for them. There were also a number of tapestries based on the cut out and paintings.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Always interesting when one can compare presentations, as well as see style and technique uses.
20 July, 2015
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