V&A Prints on tour

The V&A has an extensive collection of fine art prints and related material. The range of the modern holdings is clear from their 2001 publication, Impressions of the 20th Century, and these have been drawn on to send Modern Masters: Matisse, Picasso, Dali and Warhol on tour this year to Lincoln, Plymouth, currently Bath’s Victoria Art Gallery and soon Inverness. Visitors to the show should be able to find something of interest from all four artists in the form of prints, books and other items.

The works by Picasso spanned most of his career from 1904 to 1957. I liked the portrait of the dealer Ambroise Vollard (1937, below left) and The Sleeping Woman (1947, below right):

There were also four of the sugar-lift aquatint and drypoint etchings from the portfolio of Buffon’s L’Histoire Naturelle, including The Lizard (1942, below left), which were printed during the Occupation, and Skull of a Goat on a Table (1952, below right):

The Matisse exhibits included both the print (image unavailable) and the wood block (1905, below right) for Nude in Profile on a Chaise Longue. The lithograph Interior, Reading (1925, below right) is of a subject he painted on various occasions:

Visitors to the recent Matisse exhibition at Tate Modern may have come away with the impression that his later work consisted only of cut-outs. Not so, as demonstrated colourfully by Marie-Jose in a Yellow Dress (1950, below):

Curiously, Salavador Dali was omitted from Impressions of the 20th Century. I hadn’t seen before any of the six posters which Salvador Dali designed for the French railways (SNCF) in 1969, two of the four on display here:

Andy Warhol’s work like Marilyn (exhibition poster above, three of the ten colour ways of this print are on show) is, as they say, iconic and also ubiquitous to the point of over-exposure (in a week I came across him in shows in Bath and Blenheim and at the NPG) but this colour offset litho poster from 1978, based on two of his Self Portraits from 1966, was striking:

This Louisiana is the Museum of Modern Art in Humlebaek, Denmark which, from its website, seems well worth visiting, although like many British people I’m deterred by the prospect of Danish prices. However, as the website states “DINNER BUFFET IN LOUISIANA CAFÉ EAT AS MUCH AS YOU WANT FOR DKK 149”, which would be just under £16 (US$26), perhaps I ought to think again.

Modern Masters in Print Matisse, Picasso, Dali and Warhol ends in Bath on 23 November 2014.

Matisse Cut-Outs at Tate Modern

Henri Matisse: The Cut-Outs at Tate Modern has been such a well-publicised show since it opened in April that there is little for me to add here. Matisse (1869-1954) was suffering from ill-health in the 1940s to such an extent that he had to give up painting. He turned to mounting cut-out pieces of gouached paper (découpages in French) , a technique which he had previously used to work out arrangements for paintings, as in Still Life with Shell, (1940, Nature morte avec coquillage, below top as a cut-out, below lower as an oil):

This is the starting point of the exhibition and is followed by The Lyre (La lyre, 1946, below left), as the first intentioned Matisse cut-out – later comes one of his last paintings, Interior with Black Fern (Intérieur à la fougère noire, 1948, below right):

Then comes the original set of 20 cut-out maquettes, mostly of circus subjects, which Matisse made during the Occupation and  hung above the corresponding pages of the art book, Jazz, eventually published by Tériade in 1947; The Horse/, the Rider and the Clown, plate 5 (Le cheval, l’ecuyere et le clown, 1943 below left) and Icarus, plate 8 (Icare, 1943/44 below right):

It is interesting to see the flattening of appearance and colour shift which resulted from the stencil-printing (“… the transposition, which removes their sensitivity” as Matisse put it).

There are of the order of 100 works in this show. Among the highlights are magazine and book covers, Cahiers d’Art, 1936 (below top) and Henri-Cartier Bresson’s The Decisive Moment, 1952 below lower): 

... the designs for the Dominican Chapel at Vence (Alpes Maritimes department, SE France), Zulma (1950, below left) and, rather smaller, some of Matisse’s best-known images such as the Blue Nudes, (all four brought together), (Nu bleu II, 1952, below right):

... and Tate’s Snail (Escargot, 195x, below left) and The Sheaf (La grebe, 1953), below right):

This is a spectacular exhibition which, as one of its curators points out, is unlikely to be repeated and it has an appropriately fine catalogue. Visitors should be able to take away lasting impressions of Matisse’s mastery of form and colour, the latter being particularly welcome during a disappointing London summer and probably even more so during New York’s next winter - Henri Matisse: The Cut-Outs will be at Museum of Modern Art from 14 October to 15 February. It closes at Tate Modern on 7 September. Most, but not all, works appear in both London and New York - exceptions include The Swimming Pool (La Piscine, 1952, below) which has not left MoMA – but it is 1.85m x 16.4m: