Artist: sir matthew smith

Matthew Smith was the son of a rich and cultured Yorkshire manufacturer, born in Halifax , but he soon began to rebel against his father’s Victorian taste and his high class status .

He went to Slade School of Art , where he did not excel so went to France to see what the modern movement had to offer. In his lifetime he was frequently, but mistakenly , seen as an English Fauve or as a disciple of Matisse, but in fact he developed his own very independent style unlike anything in either the English or French schools.

Matthew Smith’s own uniquely turbulent style focused on still life, landscapes and uninhibited nudes and the years spent in the South of France just before the Second World War are perhaps the most significant in terms of his output.

Smith lived for almost 2 years in the exclusive Hotel Le Cagnard, set on a hill above the town of Cannes-sur-Mer , with views towards Cap d’Antibes. He would go on painting excursions in the area to paint plain air . He returned to London in April 1924 for the successful exhibition at Tooth’s when he sold a significant amount of his recent output although the critics of the time commented on his use of his blue and red combinations . He returned to France and in 1967 Lefevre Gallery held an exhibition , ‘Entente Cordiale ‘ where Matthew Smith was shown along side Bonnard, Braque, Derain, Matisse, Rouault, Utrillo and Vuillard . By this point he was highly regarded and could hold his own with the likes of Bell, Grant, John, Nash , Sickert and others who had contributed to the same exhibition .

He was good friends with Epstein staying in his Epping forest cottage from time to time while Paul Nash and his wife visited Smith in the South of France .

Matthew Smith died in 1959 at the age of 80yrs and his work is included in the Tate collection as well as many other important public collections world wide.