Henri Julien Félix Rousseau (French:[ɑ̃ʁiʒyljɛ̃feliksʁuso]; 21 May 1844 – 2 September 1910)[1] was a Frenchpost-Impressionist painter in theNaïve orPrimitive manner.[2][3] He was also known asLe Douanier (the customs officer), a humorous description of his occupation as atoll and tax collector.[1] He started painting seriously in his early forties; by age 49, he retired from his job to work on his art full-time.[4]
Ridiculed during his lifetime by critics, he came to be recognized as a self-taught genius whose works are of high artistic quality.[5][6] Rousseau's work exerted an extensive influence on several generations ofavant-garde artists.[4]
Rousseau was born inLaval, Mayenne, France, in 1844 into the family of a tinsmith; he was forced to work there as a young child.[7] He attended Laval High School as a day student, and then as a boarder after his father became a debtor and his parents had to leave the town upon the seizure of their house. Though mediocre in some of his high school subjects, Rousseau won prizes for drawing and music.[8]
After high school, he worked for a lawyer and studied law, but "attempted a small perjury and sought refuge in the army."[9] He served four years, starting in 1863. With his father's death, Rousseau moved toParis in 1868 to support his widowed mother as a government employee.[citation needed]
In 1868, he married Clémence Boitard, his landlord's 15-year-old daughter, with whom he had six children (only one survived). In 1871, he was appointed as a collector of theoctroi of Paris, collecting taxes on goods entering Paris. His wife died in 1888 and he married Josephine Noury in 1898.[citation needed]
From 1886, he exhibited regularly in theSalon des Indépendants, and, although his work was not placed prominently, it drew an increasing following over the years.Tiger in a Tropical Storm (Surprised!) was exhibited in 1891, and Rousseau received his first serious review when the young artistFélix Vallotton wrote: "His tiger surprising its prey ought not to be missed; it's the alpha and omega of painting." Yet it was more than a decade before Rousseau returned to depicting his vision of jungles.[4]
In 1893, Rousseau moved to a studio inMontparnasse where he lived and worked until his death in 1910.[10] In 1897, he produced one of his most famous paintings,La Bohémienne endormie (The Sleeping Gypsy).
In 1905, Rousseau's large jungle sceneThe Hungry Lion Throws Itself on the Antelope was exhibited at the Salon des Indépendants near works by younger leading avant-garde artists such asHenri Matisse, in what is now seen as the first showing ofThe Fauves. Rousseau's painting may even have influenced the naming of the Fauves.[4]
WhenPablo Picasso happened upon a painting by Rousseau being sold on the street as a canvas to be painted over, the younger artist instantly recognised Rousseau's genius and went to meet him. In 1908, Picasso held a half serious, half burlesque banquet in his studio atLe Bateau-Lavoir in Rousseau's honour.[1]Le Banquet Rousseau, "one of the most notable social events of the twentieth century," wrote American poet and literary criticJohn Malcolm Brinnin, "was neither an orgiastic occasion nor even an opulent one. Its subsequent fame grew from the fact that it was a colorful happening within a revolutionary art movement at a point of that movement's earliest success, and from the fact that it was attended by individuals whose separate influences radiated like spokes of creative light across the art world for generations."[11]
Maurice Raynal, inLes Soirées de Paris, 15 January 1914, p. 69, wrote about "Le Banquet Rousseau".[13] Years later the French writerAndré Salmon recalled the setting of the illustrious banquet:
Here the nights of theBlue Period passed... here the days of theRose Period flowered... here theDemoiselles d'Avignon halted in their dance to re-group themselves in accordance with the golden number and the secret of the fourth dimension... here fraternized the poets elevated by serious criticism into the School of the Rue Ravignan... here in these shadowy corridors lived the true worshippers of fire ... here one evening in the year 1908 unrolled the pageantry of the first and last banquet offered by his admirers to the painter Henri Rousseau called the Douanier.[11][12][14]
After Rousseau's retirement in 1893, he supplemented his small pension with part-time jobs and work such as playing a violin in the streets. He also worked briefly atLe petit Journal, where he produced a number of its covers.[4]
An equally famous work by Rousseau, included in the collection ofJohn Hay Whitney, isTropical Forest with Monkeys, which was painted during the last months of his life. It shows one of his signature exotic landscapes, lush, tropical, and virgin. Many of the animals in Rousseau's images have human faces or attributes. The central monkeys in this painting hold green sticks from which strings appear to dangle, suggesting fishing poles and human leisure activities, thereby emphasizing the quasi-human experience of the animals. In this sense Rousseau's anthropomorphized primates can be seen not as true wild beasts, but rather as representing an escape from the "jungle" of Paris and the everyday grind of civilized life.[15]
In the same month Rousseau suffered aphlegmon in his leg, one which he ignored.[16] In August, when he was admitted to theNecker Hospital[17] inParis where his son had died, he was found to havegangrene in his leg. After an operation, he died from ablood clot on 2 September 1910.
We salute you Gentle Rousseau you can hear us. Delaunay, his wife, Monsieur Queval and myself. Let our luggage pass duty free through the gates of heaven. We will bring you brushes, paints and canvas. That you may spend your sacred leisure in the light and Truth of Painting. As you once did my portrait facing the stars, lion and the gypsy.
Rousseau claimed he had "no teacher other than nature",[3] although he admitted he had received "some advice" from two establishedAcademic painters,Félix Auguste Clément andJean-Léon Gérôme.[18] Essentially, he was self-taught and is considered to be a naïve or primitive painter.
His best-known paintings depict jungle scenes, even though he never left France or saw a jungle. Stories spread by admirers that his army service included theFrench expeditionary force to Mexico are unfounded. His inspiration came from illustrations in children's books[19] and the botanical gardens inParis, as well as tableaux of taxidermy wild animals. During his term of service, he had also met soldiers who had survived the French expedition toMexico, and he listened to their stories of the subtropical country they had encountered. To the criticArsène Alexandre, he described his frequent visits to theJardin des Plantes: "When I go into the glass houses and I see the strange plants of exotic lands, it seems to me that I enter into a dream."
Along with his exotic scenes there was a concurrent output of smaller topographical images of the city and its suburbs.
He claimed to have invented a new genre ofportrait landscape, which he achieved by starting a painting with a specific view, such as a favourite part of the city, and then depicting a person in the foreground, most notably his earlyMyself, Portrait-Landscape (1890).
Rousseau's flat, seemingly childish style was disparaged by many critics; people often were shocked by his work or ridiculed it.[6][20] His ingenuousness was extreme, and he always aspired, in vain, to conventional acceptance. Many observers commented that he painted like a child, but the work shows sophistication with his particular technique.[3][6]
The American poetSylvia Plath was a great admirer of Rousseau, referencing his art, as well as drawing inspiration from his works in her poetry. The poem, "Yadwigha, on a Red Couch, Among Lilies" (1958), is based upon his painting,The Dream, whilst the poem "Snakecharmer" (1957) is based upon his paintingThe Snake Charmer.[22]
The song "The Jungle Line", byJoni Mitchell, is based upon a Rousseau painting.[23]
Underground comic artistBill Griffith drew a four-page biographical sketch of Rousseau,A Couch in the Sun, which was included in issue #2 of theArcade anthology.[citation needed]
The visual style ofMichel Ocelot's 1998 animation film,Kirikou and the Sorceress, is partly inspired by Rousseau, particularly the depiction of the jungle vegetation.[24]
A Rousseau painting was used as an inspiration for the 2005 animated filmMadagascar.[25]
Rousseau's 1908 paintingFight Between a Tiger and a Buffalo was used as the inspiration for a series of 2021 advertisements concerning the rebrand ofFacebook into themetaverse companyMeta.[26]
Two major museum exhibitions of his work were held in 1984–85 (in Paris, at the Grand Palais; and in New York, at theMuseum of Modern Art) and in 2001 (Tübingen, Germany). "These efforts countered the persona of the humble, oblivious naïf by detailing his assured single-mindedness and tracked the extensive influence his work exerted on several generations of vanguard artists," critic Roberta Smith wrote in a review of a later exhibition.[4]
A major exhibition of his work, "Henri Rousseau: Jungles in Paris", was shown at theTate Modern from 3 November 2005 to 5 February 2006, organised by the Tate and theMusée d'Orsay, where the show also appeared. The exhibition, encompassing 48 of his paintings, was on display at theNational Gallery of Art in Washington from 16 July to 15 October 2006 and at theGrand Palais in Paris from 15 March to 19 June 2006.[27][28]
TheBarnes Foundation and theMusée de l’Orangerie, Paris organizedHenri Rousseau: A Painter’s Secrets, featuring nearly 60 of Rousseau’s works. The exhibit was shown at the Barnes Foundation[29] from 19 October 2025 – 22 February 2026 and the Musée de l’Orangerie[30] 25 March – 20 July 2026. The catalog was edited by Christopher Green and Nancy Ireson.ISBN978-0-300-28435-5
^Karen Lee Spaulding (ed.)Masterworks at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, (1999), first published as125 Masterpieces from the Collection of the Albright-Knox Art Gallery (1987). Hudson Hills Press / Albright-Knox Art Gallery. p. 72.ISBN978-1555951696
^Joann Moser (1985) "Pre-Cubist Works, 1904–1909" inJean Metzinger in Retrospect. The University of Iowa Museum of Art, J. Paul Getty Trust, University of Washington Press. pp. 34, 35.ISBN978-0874140385
Much of the information in this article was taken fromHenri Rousseau Jungles in Paris, TheTate Gallery, pamphlet accompanying the 2005 exhibition.
The Banquet Years, by Roger Shattuck (includes an extensive Rousseau essay)
Henri Rousseau, 1979, Dora Vallier (general illustrated essay)
Henri Rousseau, 1984,The Museum of Modern Art New York (essays by Roger Shattuck, Henri Béhar, Michel Hoog, Carolyn Lanchner, andWilliam Rubin; includes excellent color plates and analysis)
Rousseau text written for young readersArchived 6 May 2009 at theWayback Machine Brief introduction to the artist's life and art. Entry contains links to two large reproductions of Rousseau paintings in the National Gallery of Art, a 4th grade lesson relating Rousseau's paintings to ecology, and hands-on activities suitable for classroom or home study.
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