Matisse & Renoir: New Encounters at the Barnes

Henri Matisse. Red Madras Headdress (detail), 1907. BF448. © 2024 Succession H. Matisse / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Two innovators in modern European art, Pierre-Auguste Renoir (French, 1841–1919) and Henri Matisse (French, 1869–1954) were also among Dr. Albert Barnes’s favorite painters. He collected their artwork voraciously over the course of four decades. On view in the Roberts Gallery, Matisse & Renoir: New Encounters at the Barnes presents 34 of these works in a display that reflects the expansion of our educational program, emphasizing the objects’ art-historical context.

Renoir was nearly 30 years older than Matisse. As a member of the impressionist group that upended painting conventions in the late 19th century, Renoir paved the way for Matisse to develop his own radical approach to color and form in the next century. Their boundary pushing, in fact, changed the way successive generations of artists thought about color as an expressive compositional tool. The two artists met in 1917, near the end of Renoir’s life, and engaged in a creative dialogue over the next two years that Matisse cherished.

Arranged by artist and time period, the installation shows the stylistic development of both artists across their careers as well as the subjects and motifs they fruitfully revisited. By placing such iconic works in new contexts and juxtapositions, Matisse & Renoir: New Encounters at the Barnes encourages fresh perspectives.