Henri Rousseau was a French painter who worked during the post-impressionist era. He was born in 1844 and worked as a tinsmith under his family. He lacked skill in many things, but shone in art and music. He worked as a lawyer for a short while, and served 4 years in the French military.

His art career began to take off through his many exhibitions at the Salon des Indépendants, where his was work was showcased regularly. He started out small, but after his work began drawing in more people, he was shown more prominently. His first widely viewed painting was “Tiger in a Tropical Storm (Suprised!)”, but he didn’t create many other jungle scenes until a decade later in his career.

His success was found primarily through his striking jungle scenes, which held very little space, depicting flat 2-D scapes while still giving the illusion of perspective. His work with colour is striking and he favoured animals as his subjects, which was unlike any other artist at the time.

I personally love his work. It struck me immediately, a bit like a slap in the face. Before selecting an artist to write about, I always look at their work as I would much rather write about someone I genuinely like than a random name off a page. When researching for this weeks blog post, I looked at Edouard Vuillard, Pierre Bonnard and Odilon Redon and nothing stuck out to me. This was not the same with Rousseau. His paintings made me pause, and I selected a few to view further. They are eye catching, skillful and exciting. I’m a fan.