Henri Matisse was born in Le Chateau, in the north of France. Matisse's early paintings were dark, naturalistic works, but by 1896 he had taken up Neo-Impressionist techniques, working in light color and short strokes. By 1905, he was the leader of the Fauve movement, and by 1908 he had embarked on the course that was to influence all contemporary painting since that date: an exploration of the possibilities of painting as a decorative and sensuous art. C?zanne, who expressed depth through color, was Matisse's primary influence. Gauguin and van Gogh influenced his use of color to express emotion, his simplified or distorted drawing, and his sacrifice of realistic illusions of depth to an emphatic surface pattern. Retaining volume within the limits of color and design, Matisse juxtaposes intense colors, varied patterns, and a rhythmic line. By 1918, he had a worldwide reputation, and was commissioned to do book illustrations, ballet sets, and murals. His most famous mural "La Danse," painted for the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia (1931-33), achieves its effect by an extreme simplification of figures in a moving pattern of graceful lines. Matisse died in Vence, in the south of France, in 1954.
