I have said it often and others have said it to me: “Someone should write a piece about Pierre Matisse.” Throughout his long career as a distinguished art dealer in New York, he remained a taciturn and extremely private man who was felt to be remote and somewhat cold by many visitors to his gallery. Unlike, for instance, Leo Castelli, who became as famous as his artists, whose oracular pronouncements about art were treated as Delphic, Pierre Matisse never made a public or quoted statement that I can recall.

A list of the artists he represented, most of whom he introduced to America and promoted during the most difficult years of the art market, should be enough to ensure him lasting fame.[1] They include Calder, Miró, Giacometti, Chagall, Matta, Dubuffet, Matisse (his father), the Spaniards Saura and Millares, Zao Wou-ki, the sculptors Ipoustéguy and Reg Butler, Riopelle, and the Ame ...

This article is available to subscribers and for individual purchase