Woman on a Divan

In 1917 the war was in its fourth year, several of the painters Matisse knew were in uniform, and he stayed in Paris working day after day from one hired model. She was Italian and is remembered only by her first name, Lorette. From the end of 1916 she sat for him again and again, in a turban, in a green robe, holding a coffee cup. Here she lies full length on a divan, wrapped in a black lace shawl. Matisse painted this composition twice. The larger canvas, known as The Black Shawl, belongs to the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena. This smaller one sets a dark red wall behind her where the other has yellow-green, and it has stayed in private hands. It was shown in Paris in 2016, at the Musée de l'Orangerie, in an exhibition devoted to the poet Guillaume Apollinaire and the painters he championed.