How does Henri Matisse use and apply color in his paintings? What type of colors were predominantly used in his work?

Henri Matisse had several styles throughout his life, during which he used different color palettes. He learned Academic French painting as a student, was a leader of the short-lived Fauvist movement, and changed his art to reflect the two different wars he lived through.

As a student, he painted in the traditional Flemish style. These paintings were often created with a dark palette and were considered quite sad in nature. 

After setting out on his own, Matisse rebelled against the distinction of line and color. He began to employ pointillism and his paintings tended towards having soft, blurry outlines, and a paler diffusion of light which was then associated with the unpopular Impressionist style. The markers of the Fauvist movement, however, were intense colors, often unrelated to the actual color of the subject. For instance, they might use green tints against pink skin. Instead of creating art with the illusion of objectivity, he painted the conscious subjection of his vision. He was bold with his colors. Although that movement declined, Matisse's art transformed and continued.

After the decline of the Fauvist movement, Matisse went to Paris, where he spent some time with Gertrude Stein. During this time, he visited Morocco and Tangiers, and Oriental aspects, including Odalisques and a more pronounced use of the color black, appeared in his work.

After the war, he moved to the south of France, where his structure and colors softened and relaxed further, reflecting perhaps his location and the mood of a post-war world. His colors in this time were bright and warm, reflecting the Mediterranean light and style of Southern France.

World War II changed his art once again. By this point, Matisse was an old man, soon to be diagnosed with cancer. Because of his diagnosis, his art changed from painting and sculpture to something that was less draining: cut-out paper. These paper creations utilized stark color with sharp edges.

It is difficult to characterize Matisse's art in just one way, since he lived a long life and painted throughout all of it. However, for much of his life, Matisse was interested in the way color could make a person feel about the subject, instead of creating a facsimile of the colors he saw. Although his paintings were sometimes dark and sometimes light, they were always soft. The intention was to exhibit an emotion, not capture a scene.