Raphael Rubinstein considers the influence of Henri Matisse - whose work "under the best conditions, gives considerable space to other artists to construct something new" - on a group of American painters in post-war Paris, including: Sam Francis, Shirley Jaffe, Norman Bluhm, Joan Mitchell and Kimber Smith.
Rubinstein argues that these painters shared a connection to Matisse through French art historian Georges Duthuit: "All these painters were marked by their years in Paris in ways that set them apart from their U.S.-bound contemporaries, but the importance of their encounter with the work of Matisse, and with Duthuit’s interpretation of it, can’t be underestimated."
Henri Matisse: The Cut-Outs is on view at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) through February 8, 2015.
