Matisse in Morocco A journey of light and color

In this haphazard study, Morocco author Koehler wraps multiple historical narratives around two trips that French painter Henri Matisse (1869--1954) took to Morocco. Matisse, a prominent member of the fauvist movement, was at a reputational low point in 1912, as the avant-garde community turned to cubism and Picasso. Seeking a new direction and to fulfill outstanding commissions, he left Paris for Tangier. The choice initially seemed disastrous, as bad weather kept him inside and Islamic prohibitions against images of living creatures made finding models difficult. He returned to France with a crop of new paintings later that year, but chose to exhibit none, then went back to Tangier, finding new subjects and incorporating Islamic motifs into his work. Woven into the narrative are tangents on Moroccan history; details of the French painter Eugène Delacroix's 1832 trip to Morocco; profiles of Matisse's primary collectors; and an account of the 1990--1991 exhibition of Matisse's Morocco paintings at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. Matisse's story doesn't conform to the typical "blocked artist travels to a foreign land and finds his way" narrative, and Koehler's sensitivity to Orientalist tropes means he doesn't force such an interpretation. However, he struggles to find a unifying story to tell amid all the tangents, which--while individually interesting--cause the book, before long, to collapse under its own weight. It's a mixed bag. (June)

Matisse's journey for inspiration. In 1912, 42-year-old Matisse sailed for Tangier with his wife, Amélie. At a low point in his career, his work denigrated by critics and fellow artists, even his early patrons Gertrude and Leo Stein had stopped buying his paintings. He needed to escape the Parisian art scene and find inspiration elsewhere. In an engaging biography, journalist Koehler recounts Matisse's two stays in Morocco, the first lasting 21/2 months, which resulted in 12 paintings, and the second, from October 1912 to February 1913, during which he completed another dozen paintings, some of his most acclaimed. Matisse had long been fascinated by Islamic art, from the time he visited the Turkish and Persian pavilions at the Paris Exposition Universelle of 1900. The many Islamic textiles he collected sometimes appear in his work. But, Koehler asserts, he "shunned the classic Orientalist themes--the harem, ceremonial 'fantasias' of galloping horses, and sultans in magnificent dress--or even the popular ones of the orange sellers in the souq or village women with straw hats offering bouquets of irises." He was interested, instead, in the particular light of North Africa, and in his first days in Tangier, when it rained incessantly, he was irritably frustrated. Finally, when the weather cleared, he set himself to painting nature "with a different palette." He was eager, as well, to use models. Because of a taboo on posing, this quest proved difficult, until he found a young man who both modeled and served as an intermediary. Koehler sets the Moroccan visits in the context of political tensions, cultural change, and Matisse's relationship with two wealthy Russian collectors. Reproduced in vibrant color plates, Matisse's "lush, sensual" paintings give striking proof of his artistic reawakening in Tangier. A revealing look at an iconic painter. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.