Henri Matisse painted some pretty amazing pieces, my favorite being Goldfish. He painted this painting in 1912 using oil on a canvas. The painting uses bright contrasting colors, those being different pinks and greens. Bright orange goldfish form the centerpiece. Matisse painted Goldfish when he was inspired by a trip he had taken to Morocco. He wanted to create a peaceful feeling in this painting and his use of color and shapes really reflect that.
This painting uses different shades of green for the different shapes of leaves and different pinks for the different flowers that are all around this bowl of goldfish. The fish have very bold eyes and one even has its mouth open as if he’s hungry. The goldfish bowl isn’t so much a bowl, so as a large, tall vase. The opening of the bowl isn’t a completely perfect circle, it has a glossy look to it, which makes it look like its floating rather than connected as a whole. The shape of this
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“[He] once wrote that he dreamt of ‘an art of balance, of purity, and serenity, devoid of troubling or depressing subject matter, an art that could be a smoothing, calming influence on the mind, something like a good armchair that provides relaxation from fatigue.’” (Wilkins par 7) The fish don’t look disturbed or worried, they’re just floating together. The painting has many curved lines and soft colors which makes it more calming. It’s not hard to complicated to look at, there isn’t a huge, difficult meaning behind these fish rather a clear, simple message of relaxation. Matisse wasn’t saying anything exactly, he was inspired by his trip to Morocco, where he found the people to be relaxing and contemplative. So he painted a soft, relaxing image of fish and flowers. He painted this after returning from Morocco, which I’d say was his motivation because “he noted how the local population would day-dream for hours, gazing into goldfish bowls.” (Wilkins par