The elements in Red Studio invite you into Matisse’s world. To me the "empty" bit in the foreground reads as floor space, where I’d step to be amongst the things in the studio. The elements form a kind of nest in which the creative process takes place.
The paintings depicted are all by him, as are the sculptures (1&2). Notice the box of pencils or charcoal (3) on the table, and his easel (4). Though why doesn't the clock have hands (5)?
Is Matisse describing the creative process? The table acts as a container for the ideas of food and drink, nature, and artist's materials; the essence of an artist's life. There's representation of different subjects: portraits, still life, landscape. A window for illumination. The passage of time is denoted both by the clock and the framed/unframed (unfinished?) paintings. A comparison is made to the three dimensionality of the world with sculptures and a vase. Finally there is contemplation, a chair positioned to view the art.
Red Studio wasn't initially red. Instead it "was originally a blue-grey interior, corresponding more closely to the white of Matisse’s studio as it actually was. This quite powerful blue-grey can still be seen even with the naked eye around the top of the clock and under the thinner paint on the left-hand side. What forced Matisse to transform his studio with this dazzling red has been debated: it has even been suggested that it was stimulated in the most perceptual of ways by the after-image of greens from the garden on a hot day."
-- John Gage, Colour and Culture p212.
In her biography (page 81) Hilary Spurling says: "Visitors to Issy [Matisse's Studio] grasped immediately that no one had seen or imagined anything like this before... [The Red Studio painting] looked like a detached wall segment with rudimentary objects floating or suspended on it. ... From now on (1911) he painted realities that existed only in his mind."
