Henri Matisse: Painted at Collioure in late spring 1907, Les Pivoines combines the gestural brushwork of Fauvism with the abstract, intangible space of Matisse's revolutionary decorative mode. Within weeks of its creation, Les Pivoines was acquired for the Galerie Bernheim-Jeune by the critic Félix Fénéon, said to possess the most discerning eye for modern art in all of Paris
