Henri Matisse
(Le Cateau-Cambrésis, France, 1869 - 1954, Nice, France)
Title
untitled (portrait of Simon Bussy)
Creation Date
ca. 1935
Century
19th-20th century
Dimensions
12 in. x 7 in. (30.48 cm x 17.78 cm)
Object Type
drawing
Creation Place
Europe, France
Medium and Support
graphite on beige paper
Credit Line
Bequest of William H. Alexander, in memory of his friend, Frederick H. Wilke, M.D., Chief of Pediatrics at St. Lukes Hospital, New York
Copyright
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Accession Number
2003.11.50
Henri Matisse and Simon Bussy (1869/70--1954) were lifelong friends from the time they met as students at the Ecole des Beaux Arts. Since the early years of the twentieth century, Bussy, a painter of portraits and landscapes, divided his time between London and the South of France, socializing not only with former classmates Matisse and Georges Rouault (1871--1958), but also members of the Bloomsbury group and French writers Andre Gide and Paul Valery. In this drawing, Bussy appears as Matisse’s alter ego. A 1945 self-portrait drawing by Matisse in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art, New York is almost indistinguishable. Bussy’s slightly broader face and prominent chin and Matisse’s goatee differentiate the two, who seem to be examining the world from behind their spectacles with an equal dose of skepticism. The Bussy portrait seems to be drawn effortlessly, with great respect for the sitter, and foregoes the deliberate distortions Matisse applied to his own face.
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