About this artwork
When the 45-year-old Henri Matisse was rejected from military service at the outbreak of World War I, a friend encouraged him to contribute to the war effort the best way he could: by continuing to paint well. This led to a productive period of compositional and material experimentation that Matisse hoped would sustain the tradition of French painting in the face of a cultural and national threat.
Matisse painted this still-life composition twice—in the abstract work seen here and also in a more traditionally representational version. A hidden light source bathes the scene in warm tones, which are offset by a swath of green. Luminous black consumes the background, reflecting Matisse’s challenge to himself to use black as a “color of light, not darkness.”
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Status
- On View, Gallery 391
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Department
- Modern Art
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Artist
- Henri Matisse
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Title
- Apples
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Place
- France (Artist's nationality:)
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Date
- 1916
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Medium
- Oil on canvas
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Inscriptions
- Signed, l.r.: Henri-Matisse
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Dimensions
- 116.5 × 89.5 cm (45 7/8 × 35 3/16 in.)
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Credit Line
- Gift of Florene May Schoenborn and Samuel A. Marx
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Reference Number
- 1948.563
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IIIF Manifest
- https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/64001/manifest.json
Extended information about this artwork
Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.