Matisse The Cut-Outs

Beatufully represented Henri Matisse exhibition "The Cut-Outs" takes place at Tate Modern in London until 7/09/14. Matisse Cut-Outs were figures cut out and into painted paper and then arranged as collage (but without molding) to the surface. The artist has created a new medium, which began as an experiment in modelling and became art works in their own right.
The exhibition shows the creating process on pictures and videos: Henri Matisse is on a wheelchair whereas his assistant holding a paper and the artist with large scissors gliding through the painted sheets. The rich colour of the shapes is guache paint. Tate's colour conservator reveals, as she could see the works very close, that a lot of the paper shapes are in some parts torn rather than cut. This makes it clear that the creating process was fast and passionate; Matisse was in a hurry to make art happen and, maybe, feared to stop (as worked even at nights) as stopping would mean dying.

There are a few paintings of the artist studio interior shown at the exhibition, which Matisse has painted during his illness. This is an evidence that Matisse has actually chosen the cut outs as his medium and not entirely had to work with it due to his limited mobility.

Matisse used pins to attach the cut-outs so he could always rotate, rearrange and move the pieces around to create a wanted shape. Today the shapes are molded into their final positions. But during the artist working process the art works seemed airy and alive moving on his studio walls. Matisse was not creating paintings. He was creating spaces.

In fact he was even disappointed about the printed cut-outs illustrations for the Jazz book: printing "removes their sensitivity". At the exhibition next to the printed illustrations there are original art works where we can see that the paper pieces were layered.
Today collage artists tag their works and search online for #cutandpaste #cutart #scissorsart #papersculpture #gluepaperscissors #cutnpaste #paperlove #collageart #papercut #cutout #papercutdesign #paperartist #paperart. Henri Matisse was focused on cutting rather than pasting, but this exhibition at Tate Modern is very important for collage, recycling and any mixed media artist as it is an acknowledgement of the new medium they all use today in different ways. The medium that is created in a 3D but presented as a 2D.