MATISSE HENRI (1869-1954). - Lot 149

Lot 149
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Result : 11 050EUR
MATISSE HENRI (1869-1954). - Lot 149
MATISSE HENRI (1869-1954). 7 L.A.S. "H.M." or "H" (one "Henri Matisse"), Seville and Tangier 1910-1912, to his wife Amélie; 31 pages in-8 and 1 page in-12, 5 headed Sevilla. Circulo de Labradores y proprietarios, the last one on Villa de France Hotel letterhead, Tangier. Nice family correspondence, about his stay in Seville and Tangier, and his paintings for Shchukin. Seville 16 December 1910. He has rented a very nice studio in Seville for a month, in Argote de Molina street, for 40 pesetas, and intends to start on Monday with the first still life for Stsch. [the Russian collector Sergei SHCHUKIN, for whom Matisse did The Dance]. "I'm really up to it and I hope to do a good job. He explains his change of itinerary and projects because of the storm, and draws a small map of Spain. He is a little surprised by Chtchoukine's excitement, but as for the "meanness and imbecility of people, at the moment I am quite calm, I don't think about it at all, I enjoy this peace of mind that I haven't had for so long. [...] As for what you tell me about Purrmann, I think you're getting a bit carried away, and I think that crazy Olga would have done better to keep quiet about what she told you"... He talks to her about familiar things, including his son Pierre, the little dog, their friends Sembat and Bréal, and the linoleum at Le Bon Marché, of which he makes two sketches, in a checkerboard pattern... December 21. "I wait for your letters like a glass of fresh water in the middle of the desert, and for several days now I have either had nothing or I have had letters that were not too tender. If you continue, I will return. I cannot live like this, my nerves are not too strong, I sleep rather lightly and if I stay it is only to work"... He had news of Marquet and Jean Puy, and was worried about his mother's health... "This morning I had no time for myself to work, besides I slept badly and have a headache. [...] Maybe my work is getting on my nerves"... - 6 p.m. "Please write to me, my darling, you will do me so much good. I'm bored, you see, but I want to stay and work - encourage me, I need it, or I'll leave"... December 29, to her father-in-law, Berthe Weill and Amélie. Wishes for the New Year... He worries that he has no news of Issy and Amélie. "I have finished a large still life, which I think is good. I have received a letter from Stchukin who tells me that his decorations [The Dance and The Music] have been placed and that the effect is not bad, that he finds them interesting, but that the public is against them - at last he has confidence and hopes to triumph. He asks me to make him 3 new panels of two ½ meters by 2 as the red dining room decoration"... December 31. Disappointed that Amélie is not coming to Seville, he explains his reasons for staying: "as soon as I arrived here, my sleep almost disappeared, and really I was quite depressed. Bréal offered to let me sleep at his place for several nights, and the baths the doctor gave me, your very affectionate letters, the Sembats' expressions of friendship, calmed me down"... The floods in Granada, the commission from Shchukin, Amélie's encouragement, encouraged him to stay. However "when you knew that I had rented the studio where I work you wrote me letters that I found painful, very painful [...], from that moment on I found myself flattened. [...] Listen to me my dear, I am often right. I know what serves my purpose and my purpose is my work"... [Early January 1911]. He forwards a letter from Shchukin, received on December 29, asking for Amelie's opinion. "The three panels are the size of the Red Room (I think 1.90 x 2.50). It seems to me that the 3 for 25F would be reasonable what do you think. Let me know right away so I can respond. I am thinking of returning soon, however, as I tell you as soon as my 2nd still life is finished. For I am longing to return I am quite tired and bored. In the silence here all the critical and other things from the salon have come back to me - I had to put them in order and digest them - so that I am restless, I don't sleep much, but I think it is a hard piece to swallow, but it is necessary. So when I received this letter from Sts. I was not too happy. For the big decorations I'm glad they don't hurt. I was afraid of it because of the stairs. The future will do the rest"... Tangier Wednesday [1912]. He no longer found the Tangier he had left in the spring. "But today I saw some amazing things and I think it will work out. All the little places I knew are changed, there are no longer the flowers that were everywhere on the walls, on the little marabout of the Casbah for example everything is dry, the bottoms of the hill that we saw from the little Arab café are red, the grass is burnt, I am told that it will change quickly, a few rains will make everything green again"... Among other changes: trees cut down on the edge of
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