Salvatore Pinto, Woman on a Beach

Woman on a Beach was painted while Salvatore Pinto was in France, and demonstrates his adaptation of certain aspects found in Henri Matisse's paintings of nudes, such as the sinuous line, bright pink color, and simplified, flat forms. Pinto's figure crosses her arms over her face, blocking out the intense sun. Her voluptuous figure is framed by the stylized patterns of the sand below and the sky above.

Part of a family of artists who moved to Philadelphia from Italy in 1909, Pinto attended the Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Art (now the University of the Arts) and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. He worked in media ranging from painting and printmaking to photography and furniture design. His work hangs in the Barnes Foundation and is in many other private collections.

Pinto was a prized student of Dr. Albert C. Barnes and a teacher at the Barnes Foundation, In the summer of 1931, Pinto travelled to France with Barnes and met Henri Matisse, whose use of bright color and expansive, painterly style greatly inspired him.