©Henri Matisse - Standing Moroccan in Green. Standing Riffian 1913

Henri Matisse - Standing Moroccan in Green. Standing Riffian 1913
Standing Moroccan in Green. Standing Riffian
1913 146x97cm oil/canvas
Hermitage, St. Petersburg, Russia

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From the State Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg, Russia:
The same warrior appears seated, in the same attire, in another work by Matisse in the Barnes Collection (USA). The two paintings were executed at the end of 1912, during Matisse's second trip to Morocco, and were probably intended to be displayed together. The broadshouldered figure occupies almost the whole of the picture space but it is pure colour, light and clear, which dominates the work. The painting's cold tones seem like the mirage of an oasis in the hot air of the desert from which the warrior came.