The sincere friendship of Rouault and Matisse is born extremely early, during the years of training, when they attend the workshop of Gustave Moreau at the School of the Beaux-Arts. Moreau, that they affectionately called the owner had quickly detected the two exceptional personalities of the young painters. It prophesied that Matisse “would simplify” painting and guessed religious and mystical fibre of Rouault. We will find obviously these temperaments in the exceptional destiny of these two men. This exhibition restores us the years of intense friendship of the two artists. Their early works are exposed there coast at coast, in an interesting chronological juxtaposition of two basically different glances on identical subjects: Matisse releases the form of its conventions, precedes naked cut out its naturity, distils contrasts of light. Rouault encircles the drawing, engraves it in a stained glass of features, announcing the dark face of its art. A little later, each one will choose radically opposite ways. Rouault will precede a certain expressionism in the caricature and the disfiguration of its characters, preceding Basquiat almost. Matisse will let explode lights and colors in artificial paradises. Externality and interiority, hidden faces of two giants of the XXème century. The majority of exposed works belong to the Museum, others were entrusted by the Museum Gustave Moreau.