Henri Rousseau facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Henri Rousseau
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Rousseau in 1907 by Dornac
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| Born |
Henri Julien Félix Rousseau
21 May 1844 Laval, France
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| Died | 2 September 1910 (aged 66) Paris, France
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| Education | Self-taught |
| Known for | Painting |
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Notable work
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The Sleeping Gypsy, Tiger in a Tropical Storm, The Hungry Lion Throws Itself on the Antelope, Boy on the Rocks |
| Movement | Post-Impressionism, Naïve art, Primitivism |
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Henri Julien Félix Rousseau (born May 21, 1844 – died September 2, 1910) was a French painter. He is known for his unique style, often called Naïve art or Primitive art. This means he was mostly self-taught and painted in a simple, dreamlike way, different from the more traditional artists of his time. People also called him Le Douanier (which means "the customs officer") because he worked as a toll and tax collector for many years. He only started painting seriously in his early forties and eventually retired from his job to become a full-time artist.
Even though some critics made fun of his work during his lifetime, today Henri Rousseau is seen as a brilliant artist. His paintings have inspired many other famous artists who came after him.
Contents
Henri Rousseau's Life and Artistic Journey
Early Life and First Jobs
Henri Rousseau was born in Laval, Mayenne, France, in 1844. His family ran a tinsmith business, and he helped out from a young age. He went to Laval High School, where he showed talent in drawing and music. His family faced financial difficulties during his school years.
After high school, he worked for a lawyer and studied law. He then joined the army and served for four years, starting in 1863. In 1868, after his father passed away, Rousseau moved to Paris to support his widowed mother. He found a job working for the government. In the same year, he married Clémence Boitard, and they had six children together. In 1871, he became a collector of the octroi in Paris, which meant he collected taxes on goods entering the city. After Clémence passed away in 1888, he married his second wife, Josephine Noury, in 1898.
Becoming a Painter: Rousseau's Artistic Journey
Henri Rousseau never traveled to faraway lands, but he loved to paint amazing jungle scenes. His inspiration came from visiting the Natural History Museum and the botanical garden greenhouses in Paris. He also heard exciting stories from soldiers who had been to places like Mexico. He once said that when he saw the exotic plants in the glass houses, it felt like he was stepping into a dream.
From 1886, Rousseau regularly showed his paintings at the Salon des Indépendants, an art exhibition. Over time, more and more people started to notice his unique style. In 1891, he exhibited Tiger in a Tropical Storm (Surprised!). A young artist named Félix Vallotton gave it a great review, saying it was an incredible painting. Even so, it took more than ten years before Rousseau painted another jungle scene.
In 1893, Rousseau moved to a studio in Montparnasse, a famous artistic neighborhood in Paris. He lived and worked there until he passed away in 1910. One of his most famous paintings, La Bohémienne endormie (The Sleeping Gypsy), was created in 1897. You can see it today at the Barnes Foundation museum in Philadelphia.
In 1905, Rousseau's large jungle painting, The Hungry Lion Throws Itself on the Antelope, was shown alongside works by younger, cutting-edge artists like Henri Matisse. This exhibition is now seen as the first time the art movement called The Fauves was introduced. Rousseau's painting might have even helped inspire the name "Fauves," which means "wild beasts." In 1907, he was asked by Berthe, Comtesse de Delaunay (the mother of artist Robert Delaunay), to paint The Snake Charmer.
The Famous "Banquet Rousseau"
One day, the famous artist Pablo Picasso discovered one of Rousseau's paintings being sold cheaply on the street. Picasso immediately recognized Rousseau's special talent and wanted to meet him. In 1908, Picasso organized a special party, called Le Banquet Rousseau, in his studio in Le Bateau-Lavoir to honor Rousseau.
This banquet became a very famous event in the art world. Many important artists and writers attended, including Guillaume Apollinaire, Jean Metzinger, Juan Gris, Max Jacob, Marie Laurencin, André Salmon, Maurice Raynal, Daniel-Henri Kahnweiler, Leo Stein, and Gertrude Stein. It was a lively gathering that celebrated Rousseau's unique artistic vision and brought together many creative minds of the time.
Later Years and Passing
After retiring in 1893, Rousseau received a small pension. He took on part-time jobs to earn extra money, including working briefly for a newspaper called Le petit Journal, where he designed some of its covers.
One of his well-known works, Tropical Forest with Monkeys, was painted in the last months of his life. It shows a lush, wild jungle landscape, a style he was famous for. Many animals in Rousseau's paintings seem to have human-like expressions or actions. The monkeys in this painting, for example, hold sticks that look like fishing poles, suggesting they are enjoying leisure activities, much like people. This shows how Rousseau often imagined animals as a way to escape the busy city life of Paris.
Rousseau showed his final painting, The Dream, in March 1910. Sadly, he became very ill with a serious infection in his leg that August. He passed away on September 2, 1910, in Paris.
At his funeral, seven friends gathered at his grave, including fellow artists Paul Signac, Robert Delaunay, and the sculptor Constantin Brâncuși. The poet Guillaume Apollinaire wrote a touching message for his tombstone:
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.
Henri Rousseau's Unique Art Style
How Rousseau Painted
Henri Rousseau never went to art school. He was a self-taught artist, meaning he learned to paint all by himself. At first, people sometimes made fun of his simple, "naïve" style. However, his unique way of painting later inspired many other artists. When he was 49, he retired early to focus completely on his art. He had a small pension and also taught art to children to earn extra money.
Rousseau famously said he had "no teacher other than nature." He did get some advice from two well-known academic painters, Félix Auguste Clément and Jean-Léon Gérôme, but his style remained very much his own.
His most famous paintings show vibrant jungle scenes, even though he never actually left France or saw a real jungle. Stories that he served in the army in Mexico are not true. He found his inspiration from pictures in children's books, the beautiful botanical gardens in Paris, and displays of stuffed wild animals. He also heard exciting tales from soldiers who had been to subtropical countries. He loved visiting the Jardin des Plantes, saying it felt like entering a dream when he saw the exotic plants.
Besides his jungle paintings, he also created smaller pictures of Paris and its surrounding areas. He even claimed to have invented a new type of painting called "portrait landscape." This is where he would paint a specific view, like a favorite part of the city, and then add a person in the foreground, as seen in his early work Myself, Portrait-Landscape (1890).
Henri Rousseau's Lasting Legacy
Henri Rousseau's artwork had a huge impact on many generations of artists who came after him. Famous painters like Pablo Picasso, Fernand Léger, Max Beckmann, and the Surrealists were all influenced by his unique style. Art critics have noted that Beckmann's self-portraits, for example, show the strong, focused shapes found in Rousseau's portraits.
After his death, a special exhibition of Rousseau's works was held in 1911 at the Salon des Indépendants. His paintings were also shown at the first Blaue Reiter exhibition, another important art event. Rousseau's art was celebrated as "naïve art" in galleries, and his work continues to be admired today. The art dealer Wilhelm Uhde helped promote his work, and a collection of naïve art is now kept at the Musée Maillol in Paris.
Rousseau's influence wasn't just limited to painting. The American poet Wallace Stevens was inspired by his work, as was Sylvia Plath. Plath even wrote poems based on Rousseau's paintings, like "Yadwigha, on a Red Couch, Among Lilies" (1958), inspired by The Dream, and "Snakecharmer" (1957), based on The Snake Charmer.
His art has also appeared in popular culture. The song "The Jungle Line" by Joni Mitchell is based on a Rousseau painting. The visual style of Michel Ocelot's 1998 animated film, Kirikou and the Sorceress, was partly inspired by Rousseau's jungle scenes. Even the 2005 animated film Madagascar used a Rousseau painting as inspiration. More recently, Rousseau's 1908 painting Fight Between a Tiger and a Buffalo inspired advertisements for the rebranding of Facebook into Meta in 2021.
Major Exhibitions of Rousseau's Art
Many important exhibitions have celebrated Henri Rousseau's work. Two large museum shows took place in 1984-1985 (in Paris and New York) and in 2001 (in Germany). These exhibitions helped people understand Rousseau's determined artistic vision and how much his work influenced other artists.
A major exhibition called "Henri Rousseau: Jungles in Paris" was shown at the Tate Modern in London from November 3, 2005, to February 5, 2006. It was also displayed at the Musée d'Orsay in Paris. This exhibition featured 48 of his paintings and traveled to the National Gallery of Art in Washington from July 16 to October 15, 2006, and the Grand Palais in Paris from March 15 to June 19, 2006.
The Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia organized Henri Rousseau: A Painter’s Secrets, which included almost 60 of Rousseau’s works. This exhibit was shown at the Barnes Foundation from October 19, 2025, to February 22, 2026.
Images for kids
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A Carnival Evening, 1886, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, PA
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Self Portrait, 1890, National Gallery Prague
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Tiger in a Tropical Storm (Surprised!), 1891, National Gallery, London
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Le Moulin (The Mill), c. 1896, Musée Maillol, Paris
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Boy on the Rocks, 1895–1897, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
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The Sleeping Gypsy, 1897, MoMA, New York
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La tour Eiffel peinte par Henri Rousseau, 1898, Houston Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas
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Self-portrait of the Artist with a Lamp, 1903
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The Merry Jesters, 1906, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, PA
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The Flamingoes, 1907, Private collection
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The Snake Charmer, 1907, Musée d'Orsay, Paris
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The Repast of the Lion, c.1907, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
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Exotic Landscape, 1908, Private collection
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Fight Between a Tiger and a Buffalo, 1908, Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, Ohio
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View of the Bridge in Sevres and the Hills of Clamart, Saint-Cloud and Bellevue with biplane, balloon and dirigible, 1908, Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts
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In a Tropical Forest Combat of a Tiger and a Buffalo, 1908–1909, Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg
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The Football Players, 1908, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York
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Muse Inspiring the Poet (Portrait of Guillaume Apollinaire and Marie Laurencin), 1909, Kunstmuseum Basel, Switzerland
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Cheval attaqué par un jaguar (Jaguar Attacking a Horse), 1910, Pushkin Museum, Moscow
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Bouquet of Flowers, 1910, Tate Gallery, London
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Pierre Loti, 1910, Kunsthaus Zürich, Switzerland
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See also
In Spanish: Henri Rousseau para niños
