An Article by Our French Correspondent L.D. (531 words, 3 min. read)
As Father’s Day casts its gentle light across Paris and the world this week, a beautiful exhibition at the Musée d’Art Moderne invites us to discover the most touching father-daughter relationships in the history of art. Stepping into the exhibition: Matisse et Marguerite, dedicated to Henri Matisse and his daughter Marguerite Duthuit-Matisse, feels like walking into the quiet heart of a family, one held together by affection, trust, and the shared language of art.
The Constant Muse
More than 110 works—paintings, drawings, engravings, sculptures, and ceramics—gather here not just to show Matisse’s evolution as an artist, but to honor the woman who remained at the core of his gaze for nearly half a century. Marguerite appears again and again, a constant figure, a source of inspiration, and a living thread connecting his earliest sketches to his later masterpieces.
Drawing with the Heart
From the first portraits of her as a young girl, captured in soft pencil lines, to more complex post-war renderings, her presence radiates a calm strength. These are not just studies of a face. They are acts of love. One feels the artist looking not only at a model, but into the soul of someone who mirrored his own. Her expression, in each phase of life, reflects a quiet understanding of the man behind the brush.
Works Returning Home
Some of the most remarkable pieces come from collections in Japan, Switzerland, and the United States, and are shown in France for the first time. Their arrival feels like a reunion: Matisse’s intimate moments with Marguerite returning home to where they were first imagined.
A Chronology of Affection
The rooms unfold in chronological order, offering a story rather than a retrospective. Photographs and personal documents create a bridge between the works and the lives they represent. In the midst of Matisse’s bold colors and fluid lines, one finds traces of wartime resistance, illness, recovery, and unconditional support. Marguerite was not only a daughter, but a silent partner in his artistic journey. She stood beside him during moments of doubt and helped carry his vision forward when his health waned.
Marguerite, the Artist
In one quiet corner of the exhibition, drawings by Marguerite reveal her own voice. Subtle, assured, and deeply thoughtful. Her presence as an artist in her own right completes the portrait, showing a relationship built not on hierarchy but on mutual respect.
The Five Fingers of the Hand
Born in 1894 from Matisse’s early relationship with Caroline Joblaud, Marguerite grew up in a close-knit family alongside Jean and Pierre, the sons of Matisse and his wife Amélie. She once described them as “the five fingers of the hand,” a phrase that lingers in the mind as one moves from room to room. It captures something essential about this exhibition: a sense of unity, of love held quietly but powerfully.
A Voice That Endures
On this Father’s Day, Matisse’s tribute to his daughter becomes our tribute to fatherhood itself; not loud or showy, but constant, deep, and transformative. Through every portrait, every line and shadow, a father speaks. And through Marguerite, that voice becomes enduring.
