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Article: Cultural Comment: Essay: The scandalous triple failure of Henri Matisse The experts say the Professor's early life was dull. They are wrong, Hilary Spurling writes
- Article from:
- The Independent (London, England)
- Article date:
- November 1, 1998
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 1998 The Independent - London. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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Matisse is perhaps the last major 20th century figure whose story
has not yet been told. Ten years ago, when my editor first suggested
him as a subject, I found it hard to credit that there had never been
a biography. And I couldn't believe the art experts who assured me
that, unlike Picasso's, Matisse's life was too dull to write about.
At that stage I had nothing to go on but my instinct. So little
was known about Matisse's private life that people had simply assumed
him to be the opposite of Picasso. The more the one played the role
of joker, tearaway and rebel, the more firmly the other was cast by
contrast as a stuffily conventional citizen with bourgeois tastes and
no streak of the ...