CONJURING APPARITIONS
1914–1917

The First World War reshaped Matisse’s world. His attempt to enlist at the age of forty-five was unsuccessful. He divided his time between his studio on the Quai Saint-Michel in Paris and his house in Issy-les-Moulineaux. With Intérieur, bocal de poissons rouges [Interior with Goldfish Bowl] and Le Peintre dans son atelier [The Painter and His Model], Matisse returned to an intimate space and used the motif of the window and a more introspective take—his own place in relation to the model—to create a degree of spatial ambiguity unprecedented in contemporary painting.

His wartime portraits also became a field for radical experimentation. During sittings, Matisse sought to forge an empathetic connection with his models by trying to convey the passing flow of energy. In his 1916 portraits of actress Greta Prozor and his 1917 portrait of collector Auguste Pellerin, the sitter appears to be surrounded by an almost ghostly aura.