Las alfombras rojas

In the spring of 1906 Matisse traveled to Algeria, to the oasis town of Biskra, and came home with textiles and pottery rather than sketches. Back in Collioure on the Mediterranean coast he painted this tabletop, and the two patterned carpets that give it its name all but swallow the fruit and the jug resting on them. This is one of the first times he lets ornament run the whole picture, treating a woven pattern as seriously as a face or a landscape, a fascination with Islamic decoration that would stay with him for decades. The socialist politician Marcel Sembat bought it in 1908, and he and his wife, the painter Georgette Agutte, left it to the museum in Grenoble.