EPPH - Every Painter Paints Himself

Matisse on Making a Portrait

In 1937 Henri Matisse made some charcoal portraits of Henry de Montherlant, a French playwright whom Matisse had met the year before. The artist’s account of the process is quite revealing. The issues which art historians traditionally assume to be important in a portrait – the personality and achievements of the sitter – were of no consequence to the artist. What does seem to have interested Matisse, though, is that the mind of a creator, whether artist, writer or  scientist works in similar ways.

“Interested by Montherlant’s face, I asked him to pose for me, and during seven sessions I was able to make some drawings that were simply responses inspired by this face. An artist must be able to forget everything about the life and work of whoever poses for him… The whole time Montherlant posed, my reading of his work, which I love, was far from my mind; I took into account only the original life in his expression in making his portrait. Our conversation was mainly commonplace. But we did talk about work – everyone who works as we do knows that it always goes this way. When Pasteur and Rodin met at a party, they undertsood that each had exactly the same discipline in their work.”

1. John Klein, Matisse Portraits (Yale University Press) 2001, p. 139