For Matisse, who likened making cutouts to swimming and flying, their formation was liberating. As his scissors cut through the sheets of painted paper, Matisse was carving pure color, sculpting ...

Positive shapes are the shapes of actual objects. Negative shapes are the areas between these objects. The way positive and negative shapes act together creates the atmosphere of a composition.

Icarus Plate, Henri Matisse, 1947, paper cut out and gouache Henri Matisse played with ideas of positive and negative shapes with his cut-out works. With Icarus, is the black figure a positive ...