Matisse in the Barnes Foundation
Color was essential to Matisse’s work, and Miller’s design for the book utilizes a brilliant palette inspired by the artist.
Among its extraordinary masterworks of Post-Impressionist and early Modernist art, the Barnes Foundation contains one of the most significant holdings of Matisse in the world. The museum played a pivotal role in the artist’s career: Dr. Albert C. Barnes, the founder of the Barnes, was Matisse’s most serious American collector and in 1932 commissioned the painter to create the mural The Dance for the Foundation’s main gallery, leading to an important new phase of work. Pentagram’s Abbott Miller and his team have designed Matisse in the Barnes Foundation, a landmark three-volume set that is the first authoritative publication to document this remarkable collection in full. The beautifully produced book builds on the identity, environmental graphics, website and publications that Miller has developed for the museum since it relocated to its new home in downtown Philadelphia.
