New Acquisition: Odette magliano’s Collection

Profil DE FEMME

Pencil on paper, 1940

This portrait of Lydia Delectorskaya, a gift to Odette Magliano, is a superb addition to the museum’s collection dedicated to this essential figure from the artist’s last creative period.

Born in West Siberia, young Lydia was orphaned in the early 1920s. She was taken in by her aunt, with whom she emigrated to France in 1928 to escape the war. After an initial stay in Paris, she arrived in Nice in the summer of 1930. Chance led her to Henri Matisse, who hired her for a few months to assist in the production of Barnes’ Dance. In October 1933, she was recalled by Madame Matisse, who required the presence of a lady-in-waiting and caretaker. At the end of the same year, the artist paints her first portrait with estompe. Lydia quickly became not only Matisse’s preferred model, but also his studio assistant and secretary, until his death in 1954. Her natural grace, elegance and the purity of her face, combined with her supple, slender body, were to inspire Matisse for the last twenty years of his life. Lydia Delectorskaya is immortalized in sixty-nine paintings and a hundred drawings by Henri Matisse.

Henry de Montherlant

Lithograph, 1942

For Matisse, printmaking was no less important than painting, sculpture or drawing.
The museum is fortunate to have preserved a collection of engravings that allows us to study a significant body of work, which this lithograph adds to in a particularly relevant way.

A contemporary of Matisse, the French novelist, essayist and playwright Henry de Montherlant (1895-1972) shared the same fascination for North Africa and the cult of the Mediterranean. Wishing to unite his name with that of Matisse, Montherlant contacted him in 1935 with the idea of entrusting him with the illustrations for one of his works. Long discussions ensued between the artist and the writer and, in 1937, Matisse agreed to illustrate Pasiphaé.
The Musée Matisse holds a copy of this edition as well as an album version containing only the engravings, published on the initiative of the artist’s heirs in 1981.
Matisse produced several portraits of Montherlant during his visits to the Hôtel Régina, including some linocut profiles, such as the one at the opening of Pasiphaé. The Musée Matisse owns two of these charcoal portraits.
Lastly, the four-act drama Fils de personne, published by Gallimard in 1944 and one of the copies of which is dedicated by the author, bears witness to the friendship that developed between the artist and the writer. It joined Matisse’s library during his lifetime, then the Nice museum following a bequest from his heirs.

Archive SET: correspondence and photographs exchanged between Henri Matisse and Odette Magliano

The sale of the drawings and engravings has been accompanied by a set of archives, essential to the study of these works and to providing the general public with an insight into the context of the studio. These archives, made up of letters, telegrams and photographs, also make it possible to trace the relationship between Matisse and Odette Magliano.
The entry of the drawing and engraving into the collection will be highlighted by a special exhibition at the Musée Matisse, which will also include these archive items.