Over 280 paintings, drawings, prints, sculptures and other kinds of work on display are from Musee departemental Matisse, Le Cateau-Cambresis, the institution located in the artist's hometown and which was founded upon his donation and designed by the artist himself.

The exhibition offers a visual journey upon which one will navigate through Matisse's early life and throughout his practice in and outside France, being immersed in a world of colors and the beauty of forms that was created by Matisse, a man with imagination and who sought after happiness, harmony and inside peace.

A special section at the exhibition is dedicated to showing works and documents which traced the spread of Matisse's art and fauvism in China, between the 1920s and '40s, primarily by artists once studying and living in Europe at the time.