Henri Rousseau

Self-portrait, 1890

Henri Julien Rousseau (known as Le douanier, 1844-1910) was a post-Impressionist painter. He was born at Laval, Mayenne. He worked a variety of jobs (saxophonist, customs official) before beginning to paint at age 40. From 1886 onwards, he exhibited at the Salon des Indépendents. In 1905, he began exhibiting at the Salon d'Automne. He had an unhappy love affair in his last months. He died in Paris in 1910.

François Mathey wrote: "Rousseau is considered to be the greatest master of naïve painting, for his art combines a spontaneous vision of reality with an imaginary universe of great plastic and poetical power, in which he allied audacity with innocence, monumental composition with minute detail."

Gallery

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  Sleeping Gypsy, 1897

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  Three Apes In The Orange Grove, 1907c

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  The Football Players, 1908

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  The Dream, 1910

References

• Mathey, François (1965), The Museum of Impressionism in Paris, Fernand Hazan