Feature ArticleAt the 1905 Salon d'Automne in Paris a group of painters under the leadership of Henri Matisse shocked the art world with their paintings characterized by brilliant color, expressive brushwork, and flat composition, as in Matisse's The Green Stripe, Portrait of Mme. Matisse (1905; Statens Museum fur Kunst, Copenhagen). The critic Louis Vauxcelles, on visiting the show, called the painters the "Wild Beasts," or "Les Fauves"; the pejorative remark was exploited by hostile critics, and the name stuck.