New York February 8, 2010 -- New York Institute of Technology (NYIT) announced the newest addition to the state-of-the art NYIT Auditorium on Broadway on the Manhattan campus: the renowned artwork of painter Sophie Matisse, great-granddaughter of French painter Henri Matisse.
NYIT will also host “A Conversation” with Sophie Matisse and New York gallery owner Francis M. Naumann at the NYIT Auditorium on Wednesday, Feb. 24 at 6:30 p.m., where they will present their personal experiences, inspirations, and advice on art and culture.
Three of Matisse’s paintings – “Nighthawks,” “deMoiselles d'Avignon,” and “Blue Note” – are exhibited at the NYIT Auditorium. These paintings address similar questions about existence and its opposite, as her paintings are already familiar to the public with one discrete difference – she removes all living figures from famous paintings, leaving the viewer to ponder the rest.
“What I was so drawn to was the fact that it seemed like the people were missing in the first place,” said Matisse. “So to take them out again, I thought it would be an interesting play on mind and memory.”
This style is portrayed in her version of “Nighthawks,” a 1942 original painting by Edward Hopper that depicted a group of people sitting in a downtown diner late in the evening. The scene was inspired by a diner located in Greenwich Village, which has since been demolished and is now the site of a chain link fence that is covered with individual tiles of artwork to commemorate the events of Sept. 11. The original “deMoiselles d'Avignon,” a 1907 painting by Pablo Picasso, portrayed five nude females with angular and disjointed body shapes. “Blue Note” was not part of Matisse’s line of famous paintings without figures, but was influenced by the same ideas of existence.
“Sophie Matisse’s paintings not only add beauty to the walls of the auditorium,” said Jennifer Mitchell, coordinator for the School of Architecture and Design and curator of NYIT’s Gallery 61. “Her presence at NYIT also emphasizes the cultural importance of art, and allows all guests of the auditorium – as well as passersby – to observe the rare talent of a distinguished artist.”
Matisse’s artwork has been featured at various exhibitions throughout the world since 1998. Born in Boston in 1965, she studied at the Massachusetts College of Art in Boston and at École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Following her first solo show in New York City at Francis M. Naumann Fine Art in 2002, Matisse has made her mark on the art world, using paintings by Leonardo da Vinci, Claude Monet, and, most notably, her great-grandfather, Henri Matisse, as inspiration for her work. Naumann, owner of Francis M. Naumann Fine Art in Manhattan, represents Matisse as well as other contemporary and emerging artists.
The discussion is open to the public and will be held at the NYIT Auditorium on Broadway, located at 1871 Broadway (between West 61st and 62nd Street), followed by a reception. To RSVP, or for more information about Matisse’s paintings, which are for sale, please contact Jennifer Mitchell at 212.261.1562.
To view Ms. Matisse’s artwork, visit www.francisnaumann.com/SOPHIE/index.html.
About NYIT
New York Institute of Technology (NYIT) offers undergraduate, graduate, and professional degrees in more than 90 fields of study, including architecture and interior design; arts and sciences; education; engineering and computing sciences; health professions; management; and osteopathic medicine. A non-profit independent, private institution of higher education, NYIT has more than 15,000 students attending campuses on Long Island and Manhattan, online, and at its global campuses. For more than 50 years, NYIT has been guided by its mission to provide career-oriented professional education, offer access to opportunity and access to all qualified students and support applications-oriented research that benefits the larger world. To date, 81,500 students have graduated from NYIT. For more information, visit www.nyit.edu.
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