Dean and Grand Again

This is a view of Dean and Grand looking in the opposite direction. Both 9x12. The oil is on a mdf panel.

Early in his career Matisse started wearing a suit and tie to confound his critics and public who expected to meet a wild man. He seems to have painted in a suit and tie as well. There's a famous 1918 self-portrait in which he is fully dressed for the office, except he is painting. He must have been a deliberate and careful painter, despite all the painting and re-painting he supposedly did. If I wore a suit and tie when painting, I would have paint on it within seconds.

According to Spurling, Matisse was also celebrated as the painter who best represented the philosophy of Henri Bergson in terms of dealing with reality and emotion. Matisse was suspicious of this claim because Bergson preferred dull, academic paintings. There's the thought and there's the reality that don't often coincide. Just like painting.