Following the celebration of its fiftieth anniversary in 2013 with the exhibition Matisse, the Music at Work, the [Matisse Museum](https://www.musee-matisse-nice.org/) sheds new light on Matisse’s connection with Nice, through the theme of odalisques, a collection of works known under the generic term “Nice period” (1917 – 1929), with echoes found throughout his work, and this through a new exhibition entitled Henri Matisse: Nice, the Dream of Odalisques.
Are the odalisques a surprising return to figuration?
In 1921, when Matisse settled in Nice at 1 Place Charles Félix on Cours Saleya, his interpretation of the odalisques theme evolved from a surprising series of lithographs to align with his deep concerns related to form and line. Beyond their abundant production, the odalisques allow us to question the painter’s surprising return to figuration after the advances of fauvism in 1905.
From the traditional representation of a languid model, emanating from the atmospheres Matisse encountered in Algeria and Morocco, emerges a female character whose body’s plasticity and pose transform the composition. The painting acquires a new unity: the structure of the character joins sculpture.
The exhibition showcases this pictorial evolution by accompanying paintings, drawings, lithographs, and sculptures with personal objects, furniture, and fabrics, most of which belong to the museum’s collections and were used by the painter to create the setting surrounding the models-turned-odalisques.
This exhibition brings together works from museums and institutions such as the Museum Of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York, the Kunstmuseum Solothurn (Switzerland), the National Museum of Modern Art, Centre CCI/Georges Pompidou, the Museum of Modern Art of the City of Paris, the Musée de l’Orangerie in Paris, the Matisse Departmental Museum of Cateau-Cambrésis, the Ballets de Monte Carlo, as well as private collections, notably that of the painter’s family.
