Invariably known as "Le Douanier" Rousseau, a reference to his job with the Paris customs authority, Henri Rousseau (1844-1910) is the most celebrated of all naive artists. His stunningly colorful and imaginative jungle scenes are among the most instantly memorable images of the late nineteenth century.

Rousseau took up painting as a hobby, a diversion from checking goods at the gates of Paris, and taught himself to draw using pocket notebooks, with the suburbs of Paris as his subject-matter...

Rousseau took up painting as a hobby, a diversion from checking goods at the gates of Paris, and taught himself to draw using pocket notebooks, with the suburbs of Paris as his subject-matter. He retired early, aged 49, to concentrate on painting,by which time seven of his nine children were already dead, several of them from tuberculosis. From 1885, Rousseau exhibited sporadically with the Salon des Independants, but was never accepted by the art establishment. The innocence and charm of his work did, however, win him the admiration of the avant-garde. Picasso bought Rousseau"s Portrait of a Woman in a junk shop and held a banquet in his honor, while Hungry Lion was hung in the Salon d"Automne alongside the work of Matisse, Derain and Vlaminck.

Rousseau provides a fascinating and richly illustrated overview of the work of an unsophisticated and yet enigmatic artist.An illustrated introduction details his difficult, poverty-stricken life, and is followed by over 70 glorious, fullcolor plates representing the full range of Rousseau"s work, from the jaunty humor of The Football Players to solemn portraiture, from minutely detailed urban landscapes to the lush foliage and mysteriously lurking figures of his dreamy jungle scenes. This sumptuous volume will inform, astonish and delight any art-lover.

Introduction

The Edge of the Forest

View of the lie St-Louis

The Toll-House

Rendezvous in the Forest

Myself, Portrait-Landscape

Portrait of Pierre Loti

Tropical Storm with a Tiger

(Surprise[)

Artillerymen

The Young Girl

War

Boy on the Rocks

Portrait of a Woman

The Bievre at Gentilly

Landscape with Cattle

Bouquet of Flowers

Portrait of a Woman

The Tiger Hunt

The Watermill

The Cliff

Boat in the Storm

The Farmyard

The Chair Factory at AlfortviUe

Self-Portrait With a Lamp

Portrait of Rousseau’s Second Wife

The Artist Painting His Wife

Happy Quartet

House on the Outskirts of Paris

Child with a Puppet

Child with a Doll

The Country Wedding

Woman in Red in the Forest

Eve

The Pink Candle

Merry Jesters

Liberty Inviting the Artists to Take

Part in the 22nd Salon des

Independants

Strollers in a Park

The Snake Charmer

The Repast of the Lion

Representatives of Foreign Powers

Come to Salute the Republic as a

Peaceful Gesture

Alley in the Park St. Cloud

The Football Players

The Jungle: Tiger Attacking a Buffalo

View of the Bridge at Sevres

Battle Between a Buffalo and a Tiger

View of Malakoff

The Quay of lvry

The Fishermen and the Biplane

Banks of the Oise

Pere Juniet’s Cart

The Muse Inspiring the Poet

The Chair Factory at Alfortville

Flowers in a Vase

The Banks of the Bievre near Bicetre

The Muse Inspiring the Poet

Notre Dame

The Luxembourg Garden

Tropical Landscape: an American

Indian Struggling with an Ape

Exotic Landscape

Meadowland

The Waterfall

Forest Landscape with Setting Sun

A Horse Attacked by a Jaguar

Tropical Forest with Monkeys

Acknowledgments