by Jon Lackman | 2 September 2010 | Modern, Museums
One hundred years ago today painter Henri Rousseau died. This past spring the Fondation Beyeler marked the occasion with an exhibition of 40 of his works. In Le Monde, Thierry Savatier called it a “très belle exposition” and its 120-page catalogue “très beau”:
He’s presented often as the greatest of naive painters, but this qualification smacks of cliché and his naiveté was only superficial. The artist explored an entirely personal, baroque, and strange universe where the seen, the felt, the familiar, the strange, and even the incongruous intermingled. By transgressing norms, he heralded the arrival of the twentieth century as much as Cézanne did, though very differently … What finally characterizes Henri Rousseau is the oneiric quality of his canvases … [I]t was a source of inspiration for Max Ernst and Magritte, because these paintings were nothing less than the “photographs of dreams” that André Breton said defined surrealist painting.
“An extraordinary gathering of art historians, curators, and conservationists will gather in Houston on Saturday, October 2 to present and discuss new research into the work of Henri Rousseau. The afternoon symposium – to be held at Jones Auditorium on the University of St. Thomas campus, located two blocks east of the Menil Collection – is free of charge and open to the public.” (Via ArtDaily)