Chasing Matisse by James Morgan

Author:James Morgan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Published: 2005-07-15T00:00:00+00:00

WE AWOKE IN the morning to light rain. Slipping on our parkas, we made our way down the hill to the village, where the wet walls of the houses were the colors of ripe melon—watermelon red, cantaloupe gold, honeydew green. It was apparently the same in Matisse’s day, when the fishermen had painted their houses with colors left over from painting their boats. For all its African flavor, Collioure was deeply Catalan. After centuries of dispute, Catalonia was split between Spain and France. Spanish Catalonia stretches south to Valencia and west to Andorra; in France, the region runs as far north as Salses. Catalonians are proud of their heritage and—at least a hundred years ago—were standoffish to strangers. Unlike Beth, and with typical New World narrowness, I knew precious little about them upon our arrival in Collioure, and I quickly simplified their culture to a couple of graspable elements—tapas on the menus and rope-soled espadrilles on the men.

We walked in the village most of the afternoon. The streets were a labyrinth, a life-size puzzle whose face was color. Whether down by the romantic church or up by the medieval fort, whether behind giant double doors scaled for kings or through short single ones befitting fairies, an intriguing world hid there. On a back street above an art gallery we saw a large bright picture of a woman with these words written onto the painting:

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