Pierre Courthion


Pierre Courthion was a Swiss art critic and historian.
Courthion was educated at the University of Geneva and was awarded a scholarship to study painting at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. At the Louvre, he did his doctorate on the painter, Jean-Étienne Liotard.
In 1941, Courthion interviewed Henri Matisse, but after months of difficult negotiations, Matisse refused to have the resulting book published, just a few weeks before it was due to come out. The "lost" interview was not published until 2013.
His papers are held at the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles, California.

Publications