Le bonheur de vivre
 | |
| Artist | Henri Matisse |
|---|---|
| Year | 1905-06 |
| Type | Oil on canvas |
| Dimensions | 176.5 cm × 240.1 cm (69.5 in × 94.75 in) |
| Location | Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania |
Le bonheur de vivre ("The Joy of Life") is a painting by Henri Matisse. In the central background of the piece is a group of figures that is similar to the group depicted in his painting "The Dance". In the picture, there are several nude bodies of women and men in a landscape drenched with color.
According to Hilton Kramer Le bonheur de vivre owing to its long sequestration in the collection of the Barnes Foundation, which never permitted its reproduction in color, is the least familiar of modern masterpieces. Yet this painting was Matisse's own response to the hostility his work had met with in the Salon d'Automne of 1905, a response that entrenched his art even more deeply in the esthetic principles that had governed his Fauvist paintings which had caused a furor and which did so on a far grander scale, too."[1] (The "sequestration" Kramer referred to relates to the very limited hours of the museum, when its collection was located in suburban Merion, PA; in 2012, the collection was moved to a new, more accessible facility in downtown Philadelphia.)
References
- ↑ Kramer, Hilton, The Triumph of Modernism: The Art World, 1985-2005, 2006, Reflections on Matisse, p.162. ISBN 0-15-666370-8
External links
- Barnes Foundation, Le Bonheur de vivre
- Le bonheur de vivre (The Joy of Life) retrieved December 26, 2007
