Chapelle du Rosaire de Vence

While the simple white exterior has drawn mixed reviews from casual observers, some regard it as one of the great religious structures of the 20th century.

In 1941, Matisse, who lived most of the year in Nice in the south of France, developed cancer and underwent surgery.

She visited him and told him of the plans, the Dominicans had to build a chapel beside the girls' high school which they operated in Vence.

Father Marie-Alain Couturier, who collaborated on several artistic Catholic churches after World War II, was also involved in the project.

At the age of 77, Matisse began the project and spent more than four years working on the chapel, its architecture, stained-glass windows, interior murals and ceramics, liturgical furnishings, and the priests' vestments.

[4] The altar is made of warm brown stone, chosen for its resemblance to the color of bread and the Eucharist.

Matisse was so crippled with ailments by this time that he could only work from a wheelchair, and he had a long stick with a brush strapped to his arm and pieces of construction paper placed on the wall.

The center panel has a straight vertical and horizontal composition, while the two surrounding stations have strong diagonal lines leading to the head of Jesus on the cross.

[6] Matisse designed the priests' vestments for the chapel, using the traditional ecclesiastical colors of the religious seasons: purple, black, rose, green, and red.

Pope Pius XII requested that the nuns send the vestments to Rome to be put in the Vatican's new museum of modern religious art.

The nuns made copies of five of the sets of vestments, including chasubles, maniples, stoles, and chalice veils, and sent them to Rome.

The top of the roof is decorated with a blue-and-white zigzag pattern and carries an elaborate metal cross with a bell.