In this plate, a white elephant is recognizable at right, standing on a ball in mid-performance. Matisse described this scene as one in which an elephant remembers his childhood spent in the wild, the trees of which are represented with black, abstracted shapes. The elephant, whose captivity Matisse conveys through the use of white, is living a nightmare. Matisse chose to represent the elephant’s pain at recalling the freedom of his youth with violent red shapes that surround and pierce him.