Henri Matisse: Traits Essentiels: Monotypes 1906-1952

If painting was for Matisse the expression of a "state of condensed sensations," his engravings consisted of "Traits Essentiels" or "essential lines:" they were recordings of a single sensation, and rarely passed through any series of stages or reworkings. In fact, engraving was a refuge. Marguerite Duthuit-Matisse, co-author of a catalogue raisonné of her father's prints, describes the graphic work he often executed at the end of a painting session as an "agreeable conclusion." After several experiments with drypoint, Matisse turned toward woodcut in 1906 (and gave it up almost immediately), then worked simultaneously in monotype and etching, where he achieved an astonishing tension between surface and line. Later, he turned to linocut and to sugarlift aquatint. It is on these projects that the selection in Traits Essentiels focuses: Lithography, which Matisse practiced from 1906 to 1952, and with which he was less experimental, is excluded. Text in French only.