Biography Matisse, Henri Émile Benoît
Matisse, Henri Émile Benoît (1869-1954), French artist, leader of the
fauve group (see Fauvism), regarded as one of the great formative figures in 20th-century art, a master of the use of color and form to convey
emotional expression.Matisse was born in Le Cateau in northern France on
December 31, 1869. The son of a middle-class family, he studied and began to practice law. In 1890, however, while recovering slowly from an attack of appendicitis, he became intrigued by the practice of painting. In 1892, having given up his law career, he went to Paris to study art formally.
His first teachers were academically trained and relatively conservative; Matisse's own
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