I have always been intrigued by Matisse’s final self-portrait, The Sorrows of the King - more so the older I become. His work is a referral from Rembrandt’s David Playing the harp Before Saul in which the biblical hero plays the harp to distract the king from his sadness. It’s a depiction of mature age looking back to earlier years and especially of the role of music as a soothing elixir for all cares. Matisse represented himself as a central black form in his painting surrounded by the pleasures that have enriched his life.
My first impulse in rendering a contemporary take was to focus on the music, and the fact that Matisse used a central black form made me wish to do the same, in the form of a young, aspiring hip-hop artist hawking his music. I used old 45s - broken like a back burdened by life’s trials - to help tell the story of an old life looking back on the new, sorrows implied in the journey. As in Matisse’s work, I wanted to emphasize life’s pleasures, using flowers to symbolize musical notation and a figure paying homage to the female and sensuousness.
Matisse’s painting and the story behind it also reminds me of the work of Jean-Michel Basquiat, another painting hero of mine, and thus there is a small nod of gratitude to him in my piece as well.
