Born two years after Marie Curie, the French painter Henri Matisse (1869-1954) also made sculptures and prints. But he is best known for the dramatic use of color in his oil paintings. They were bright and vivid; this, and the loose style of his drawing, came to be called "fauve"--French for "wild." He, and others like him, were known as "Fauvists," meaning "wild beasts." As his style evolved, his later works were less "fauve" and more traditional, but still tended toward bright colors.

    Along with Pablo Picasso and Marcel Duchamp, Matisse was one of the three artists who defined the new movements in painting in the early twentieth century. No history of modern art is complete without an examination of his work.

    He was born in northern France, the first son of a rich merchant. After studying law in Paris and working in a court, he had an appendicitis attack. While he rested, his mother bought him some art supplies, and he began painting. This hobby became "a kind of paradise" for him, he said later, and he decided to become a painter--which disappointed his father.

    At 22 he returned to Paris and studied art. He was introduced to Impressionism and the work of the then-unknown Vincent van Gogh, a friend of a friend, which had a deep effect on his style. He traveled to England and Italy to study paintings there, and returned to Paris to paint. He also bought works by other artists, including a statue by Rodin, a drawing by van Gogh, and paintings by Gauguin and Cezanne.

    He enjoyed the company of a wide circle of artists, poets, and authors, many of whom he met through the American patron Gertrude Stein. He and Picasso became lifelong friends, and frequently attended the Saturday night salons at Stein's home.

    Matisse later left Paris and moved to the south of France, where he lived through the Second World War. When he became an invalid due to cancer surgery, he was unable to paint or sculpt. So he began making paper cutouts, the major medium of the last decade of his life.

    He died of a heart attack in Nice at the age of 84.

    1. person who supports the work of an artist

    2. person who sells something

    3. intense, lively

    4. terrible pain in an organ of the body

    5. gathering of poets, artists, and others

    6. all through one's life

    7. grew, changed, developed

    8. period of ten years

    9. make a statue

    10. disabled person, one who cannot do what most others can

    1. patron 2. merchant 3. vivid 4. appendicitis 5. salon 6. lifelong 7. evolved 8. decade 9. sculpt 10. invalid