Christopher C. Gorham’s Matisse at War is both a compelling examination of an artist at a crossroads and a reminder of the importance of preserving culture amid oppression. Focusing on the painter, sculptor, and printmaker and his struggles with his health, family, and the Nazi occupation, the book presents a historical reevaluation of his life in Vichy, France.
Gorham, a lawyer, educator, and acclaimed author of The Confidante, uses Henri Matisse’s correspondence, archival materials, and the art he created during this period to argue that he did not turn a blind eye to the forces around him or collaborate with the occupying German forces in France.
He explained how the ideas for the book came about.
“I’ve always been interested in history and art. In college, I was interested in the poets of World War I. Because of that interest, years ago, I came across a book called Artists Under Vichy, and one of the chapters was written by a scholar who wrote that Henri Matisse was not only indifferent to the war and the occupation around him in the Vichy regime, but he was tacitly in agreement with them.
“So, when I learned later that Matisse’s daughter, Marguerite, had been in the French resistance and had risked her life, this made me think about how Matisse could be okay with the Vichy regime while his daughter was in the French resistance. That was really the birth of the idea for the book.”
With the idea of the book germinating in his head for over fifteen years, Gorham finally decided to work on the book in earnest in 2021 when he began to research and reach out to Matisse scholars.
Although familiar with the artist’s work and the city of Nice, Gorham didn’t come from an academic background. Undaunted, he was keen to learn all he could about Matisse.
“I was willing to scale the heights of the learning curve to get myself into a position to discuss Matisse’s work to a lay audience. There was certainly a learning curve for me, but one that was a labor of love. I take a lot of pride in being able to describe events in a way that makes people want to turn the page,” notes Gorham.
Informative and well-paced, Matisse At War begins by chronicling his life before World War II. From his time in Montmartre, to his struggling to be received as a great artist, to his rise to becoming one of the pillars of Modernism, the artist was always fending off critics and judging eyes.
In the 1930s, Matisse had a lot going on. After achieving a measure of success, he was in the midst of an artistic breakthrough after abandoning Fauvism. He had strained relations with his family, and he was not physically well.
Always focused on remaining artistically relevant, Matisse let his domestic life become a shambles. He had a strained relationship with his wife, Amélie, and his children. The father of two sons, Jean and Pierre, he also adopted his spouse’s daughter, Marguerite. A distant father and husband, Matisse was not always present in their lives.
As an artist, Matisse had no greater champion than Amélie. She worked tirelessly to support his career while managing his practical affairs. However, things got even trickier when he met the Russian model Lydia Delectorskaya, a woman who would become his assistant and muse. She took over running his home and studio full-time after Matisse’s wife left him in 1939.
Gorham’s examination of this triangle helps readers understand Matisse’s frame of mind as war broke out. He also brings the Nazi invasion of France in 1940 to life in vivid detail, especially as it pertained to Matisse, who was seriously ill with cancer, recovering from a failed marriage, and considering his next steps.
As the author explains, Matisse fled Paris and took refuge in Nice with Delectorskaya. It was a difficult decision for the artist, especially since many of his colleagues were fleeing the country.
Although confined to his bed by cancer, Matisse’s safety was never on solid footing. The Nazis often checked in on him and searched his studio and home.
As for his family, they were actively fighting fascism. His daughter was involved in the French Resistance (she was eventually arrested and tortured by the Gestapo), and his estranged wife worked with the Communist underground. His youngest son, Pierre, aided Jewish artists to sanctuary in New York, and his teenage grandson risked his own life by defying the Nazis and their Vichy collaborators.
Matisse at War also tells how, in a time of political upheaval and poor health, Matisse, unable to paint like in previous years, reinvents himself as an artist, creating paper cut-outs and collages via a process called decoupage.
Matisse saw his exploration of this new technique as a form of defiance. In addition to reviving his spirits, these works, most prominently featured in Jazz, a collection of twenty prints consisting of cut-out collages created in 1947, marked a significant shift in his artistic output.
This shift in process, combined with his earlier work, made Matisse a source of intrigue for later art enthusiasts and scholars. Matisse’s rediscovery was a subject of great interest to Gorham.
“He’s someone who has had waves of scholarship about him. There were lots of times when decades would pass, and his artistic reputation would not be what we think it ought to be. He’d been laughed at by the Surrealists and overcome by the Cubists. Also, for a long time, he was not considered the tip of the spear of the avant-garde.
“He was taking artistic pivots, and it often took scholars and collectors, and critics decades to place what he was doing and get a scholarly sense of the context in which these paintings and cutouts were made,” he adds.
The book also goes into detail about how Matisse’s exile in Nice was challenging for the artist. Gorham outlined the state of his health during this period.
“He was deathly ill in 1941. He had an abdominal surgery, then he had a second surgery, then there was an infection, and he drifted between life and death. The doctors didn’t think he’d make it past 1941 or early 1942. You see photographs of him in 1942 looking a little underweight, sitting up in bed with a nightshirt on and his round glasses, and his white beard, and in his hand is a fistful of brushes. It’s remarkable that this ill man, on death’s door, wanted to get up and see the sun and start creating”
The tome also delves into the fractured relationship between Pablo Picasso and Matisse and how it changed when war broke out. This exploration of artists walking divergent paths, uniting for a common cause, is one of the compelling sections of the book.
To better understand Matisse’s relationship with Picasso, his life during wartime, and his relationship with his family, Gorham’s research drew upon his notes, letters, and correspondences.
He commented on his research process.
“The most useful bits of research were the various letters and correspondences that Matisse had with people who were close to him and his letters to his son, Pierre. These are in New York at the Morgan Museum. They are an amazing trove.
“His letters to Pierre Bernard, an elderly artist also in the south of France at the same time, were very moving and very touching. Bernard was ill and in his 70s. There was not enough petrol to really get around, so they couldn’t visit each other very often. Yet they carried on a very touching correspondence.”
In Gorham’s care, these letters helped craft a narrative that is penned with the excitement of a crime thriller. As a result, Matisse at War never drags.
Filled with larger-than-life people, ripped from the salons of France, the alleys of Nice, and the French underworld, Matisse at War offers a contemporary analysis of the artist’s life during World War II.
Exploring the artist and his legacy with fresh eyes, Gorham takes readers on a journey of reinvention, perseverance and wartime suffering. Well researched and vivid, Matisse at War intersects art and war, shedding new light on one of the most prolific artists of the twentieth century.
The St. Louis Art Museum, in partnership with the St. Louis Jewish Book Festival will host a conversation with Christopher C. Gorham about his book, Matisse at War on November 6 at 1 p.m.
For tickets and more information visit: https://www.showpass.com/ph-jbf-event-4/ | Rob Levy
The St. Louis Jewish Book Festival runs from now through November 17, with bonus events scheduled in December and February. For more information, a full schedule of events, or to purchase tickets, visit https://jccstl.com/arts-ideas/st-louis-jewish-book-festival/.
