Male Speaker 1

Once again, here is the MIA’s Erika Holmquist-Wall.

Erika Holmquist-Wall

This was actually Claribel and Etta’s favorite picture. And I think his painting really expresses Matisse’s wonderful appetite for color and ornament. You got it all in this painting. He visited Nice every winter and he would take a different hotel room or an apartment every year. So he was moving around and then just kind of setting up his props and wherever he landed. So we really don’t have any idea if his wonderful cinnamon-colored tiles were really so vivid, if they were such a bright red or if the bird cage really, if that brass really shown so brightly, if the patterns on the wallpaper or on the fabrics, were they really as large and decorative as they appear to be. But the Matisse’s reality on canvas and it takes us into a completely different world even if you place yourself there in the painting. Can you imagine those little birds just squawking and chitter-chattering away? Having a cup of tea with those little birds talking to you.

Male Speaker 1

Press the green button to hear more details about the composition of this painting. A visitors’ recollection of being in Matisse’s studio gives insight into how the artist took liberty with reality, press the red button to hear more. To hear Matisse explain how he composes harmonious paintings, choose the yellow button.