Henri Matisse — Women Seated on a Sofa

Painted while Matisse was staying at the Hôtel Méditerranée in Nice, this canvas belongs to a group of works from the period that link interior and exterior space. The two women in the painting aren't really the point—they're rendered simply, almost as background. Matisse's real focus is the window, the threshold between inside and out: he arranges the sofa, the dressing table, and the chair all facing it, so the eye naturally drifts toward the view beyond. Green wallpaper and red curtains lend the room a warm glow, a mood that seems to echo Matisse's own state of mind at the time—at ease, in the calm that followed the end of the First World War.