You can’t juice a dry fruit: Sylvie Fleury curates Matisse

‘Why?’ was my first thought after hearing that this show existed. To me, Sylvie Fleury and Henri Matisse go together like socks and soup. The exhibition presents the former’s work in response to a selection of the latter’s original drawings and cut-outs. ‘Drawing on Matisse’, geddit? Admittedly, I was sceptical about what seemed to be another big-name-flex at another Mayfair gallery desperate to offer a new reading on a 20th century artist for which every stone has been turned. But I’m a fan of Fleury’s work and how she playfully prods and pokes at our obsession with consumer culture. And we all like Matisse, right? It’s hard to be offended by The Dance or The Red Studio, but why are we dredging up his sketches in 2025?

I entered the gallery and was immediately mesmerised by a white fur wall. I couldn’t look away. I was drawn to it like a WAG to crushed velvet and was transported back to my childhood spent yearning for the pink fur bedroom wall that Selena Gomez’s character had in Wizards of Waverly Place. I was tempted to get the Tangle Teezer out of my bag and start brushing it. I know this isn’t what Fleury had in mind when making it, but I like to think it’s a possibility. The fur wall is the backdrop of a series of Matisse drawings that Fleury has framed with mirrors. She selected these works herself, so it’s interesting – and not surprising – that they are all female portraits. A signature strategy of Fleury’s is to appropriate symbols of masculinity and elements from the works of prominent male artists, then place them in unexpected or traditionally feminine contexts, prompting her audience to reflect on gender and power dynamics in art. She has previously ‘gender-ifed’ the works of Piet Mondrian, Frank Stella and Andy Warhol.

The exhibition comes at an interesting time, as Matisse’s work is out of copyright this year, meaning anyone can reproduce and distribute his work without seeking permission. Seeing his work in this new way, including some pieces that haven’t been shown publicly before, is, strangely, a nice send-off of sorts before his work enters the public domain, free to be reprinted on clothing, notebooks and endless other gift shop garb. 

The exhibition text explains that the show centres around the importance of the term ‘model’ and its role in art and fashion. Matisse and Fleury’s fascination with the rituals of beautification in both life and art is the show’s backbone, but it all seemed slightly tenuous to me. The show could have easily been a dialogue between Fleury and any number of other Fauvist painters, or even the likes of Egon Schiele, Salvador Dalí, Keith Haring or Gustav Klimt – all 20th century male artists who shared this similar ‘interest in beauty and fashion’.

I really wanted to like the show, but something just wasn’t working for me. Matisse’s drooping, leafy cut-outs hung next to Fleury’s pairs of dangling legs seemed too on-the-nose visually to arouse anything more than a subtle eye roll. A neon light iteration of another of Matisse’s cut-outs was a blow to the senses that even a fur wall couldn’t cushion. These pairings are meant to amplify the feminine aspects of Matisse’s work and reveal a new side of him that is “irreverent, provocative, and rebellious,” according to the exhibition text, but I wasn’t convinced. There’s only so much ​zhooshing you can do to Matisse, and this show proved that even someone like Sylvie Fleury can’t juice a dry fruit. Maybe I’m just tired of Matisse, maybe I went to Tonight Josephine one fateful night and have been tormented by neon light artwork ever since. I stared at myself for a while in the mirror of a framed sketch of some smiling lips. Maybe I’ve missed the point entirely. Maybe I need filler. I decided to have one final look around.

My last sweep of the gallery brought me back to Fleury’s giant canvases shaped like makeup palettes. Their silver casing shimmered under the gallery lights and from a distance, it almost looked like they contained real pigment powder. I’m lured in closer. It’s feminine seduction writ large, but I couldn’t help but feel like I’d been tricked into seeing a Matisse show when I really just came for Fleury, like reluctantly agreeing to go on a double date when you know you don’t fancy the other person. Has Sylvie Fleury yassified too close to the sun? The pairings felt strained and the ‘dialogue’ between the works felt as disjointed as Fleury’s severed mannequin legs, but I like to think she knew what she was doing, putting up a veneer of earnestness and giggling behind our backs. Nothing could make me dislike Fleury’s art, but maybe we should just leave the Matisse works for the tourist traps.