Henri Matisse

Galerie Pierre, Paris

(probably) Mrs. Eleanor Clay Ford, Detroit

Acquired probably by descent from the above

Albert E. Elsen, The Sculpture of Henri Matisse, New York, 1972, no. 82, illustration of another cast

Claude Duthuit, Henri Matisse, Catalogue raisonné de l'oeuvre sculpté, Paris, 1994, no. 22, illustrations of another cast pp. 49-51 (bronze edition no. 9 listed with incorrect provenance)

Claude Duthuit, Henri Matisse, Catalogue raisonné de l'oeuvre sculpté, Paris, 1997, no. 22, illustrations of another cast pp. 53-55 (bronze edition no. 9 presumed never cast)

The medium of sculpture allowed Matisse a control over his subjects that he could not have in his paintings.  The tactile experience of molding the clay with his hands enabled him to feel the form as he created it and to appreciate the sensuality of the figure in the round.  The present sculpture dates from 1906, the height of Matisse's Fauvist period.   In lieu of the wild coloration that enlivened his oils from these years, the expressive power of this work derives from the gestures of the limbs that the artist has pinched, twisted and stretched into place.

Albert E. Elsen described the allure of this semi-abstract sculpture, and noted the stylistic origins of the figure: "What Matisse's figurines may lose in terms of the illustionistic sensuousness of the subject....they gain in the sensuousness of the sculpture as an object.  They address themselves both to the hand and to the eye.  In Standing Nude with Arms Raised over Her Head of 1906, Matisse employed the classical standing beauty pose.  Even more than in his paintings, his modeled women acquired a coarseness of animality because of their ruggedly sketched faces, enlarged buttocks, short legs, and assertive breasts.....Sculpture was not simply an outlet for his artistic energies; it served his sexual feelings in ways not possible through painting" (Elsen, op. cit., pp. 64-69).