“I returned to my mother’s bedroom and thought about what I had just experienced. I had had a physical response to art. I breathed deeply and was relieved. For the first time in my life art seemed to have a tonal quality. I could almost hear the art as if it were a great chord of a symphonic piece.”
—Maya Angelou on seeing a work from Matisse for the first time in “Mom & Me & Mom”
I can’t quite remember the first time I had such a physical reaction to art. I was just thinking about this the other day, and remembering how enthralled I would become with pieces of shimmer or sparkle as a child. Whether it be a prism hanging in the window that I would take and stare at for afternoons, or photographs of beautiful women that I felt like I wanted to be one day… I’ve had many of these memories myself that I treasure, but not one as powerful and specific as Maya’s.
For her, it was a Matisse in particular that stood out to her as a thing of beauty. While I can’t be sure which exact art pieces Maya saw on that day, we can all appreciate the sentiment. Looking at Matisse’s collection, which I am not wholly familiar with, I am greeted with many bright, bold colors. I saw a piece of his that stood out to me in particular: Madras Rouge.
Let’s look at the image together and then we can talk about it a bit.
We see a woman (Matisse’s wife), maybe in her late 30’s, with sunkissed light olive skin, dark eyes, beautiful eyelashes, perfectly lined eyebrows, and black hair. She has rouge on her cheeks and lips, and is dressed beautifully. Wrapping up her hair is a red scarf with yellow wiggly lines, while her v-neck dress is black with red patterns, and a white trim with dark spots. Almost like a snow leopard print.
The woman is seated, off the side of a chair, so the side of her torso is leaning against the chair back with her left arm propped up on it. She is a really beautiful woman. She is curvy and her face has a beautiful heart shape. Her neck is long and lovely. The background of the painting is a beautiful textured turquoise blue with greenish parts.
What initially attracted me to the piece is that I can identify with it in some way. She is a woman who kind of looks like me, as we both have the same skin color, eyes, and hair. When I was a girl, a lot of the beauty ideals I was presented with were women I could not see myself as (Deliah’s catalogues, pop stars, etc.), and therefore concluded that I was wrong, odd, ugly. But seeing this portrait and really letting it sink it, I recognize that a beauty ideal like this is the one I wish I had when I was growing up. She looks healthy and gracious.
I’ll leave you with another Maya quote from this same book, as she continued to describe how fine art is one of the most human monuments there is:
Advertisements Share this:“Find a beautiful piece of art. If you fall in love with Van Gogh or Matisse or John Oliver Killens, or if you fall love with the music of Coltrane, the music of Aretha Franklin, or the music of Chopin – find some beautiful art and admire it, and realize that that was created by human beings just like you, no more human, no less.”
—Maya Angelou in “Mom & Me & Mom”
