Matisse's Jazz: A Rare Glimpse into the Artist's Cut-Out Masterpiece

Henri Matisse's limited-edition book Jazz, featuring the stencil piece The Circus, is highlighted for its rarity and significance. Created in 1947, only 350 copies exist. Jazz was Matisse's first major cut-out project, marking his transition from oil painting to paper cut-outs. The book contains 20 stencil graphics and over 70 pages of calligraphic text. Matisse used scissors to cut gouache-painted paper shapes, insisting on pochoir printing to preserve original colors. The text, drafted four or five times, explores art, artifice, intuition, and discipline. Images reference circus, mythology, and Matisse's travels; The Circus was the original working title. Recurrent motifs include balance and balancing acts, such as The Codomas trapeze act. Darker themes of wartime suffering and macabre imagery also appear. The book is held in private collections and institutions like the Art Institute of Chicago and the Museum of Modern Art.