Recollections of Henri Rousseau

Henri Rousseau (1844-1910), known as Le Douanier (the Customs Officer) after his day job, was the first outsider or naïve artist in the history of Western art to be recognised at his true worth. His astonishing paintings, particularly of jungles, have now entered popular consciousness to such an extent that it is difficult now to imagine how strongly they were resisted at the time. Much of the credit for this transformation is due to the author of these Recollections, the dealer and historian Wilhelm Uhde. It was Uhde who put on Rousseau’s first exhibition, and the catalogue he wrote for the occasion is the basis of the Recollections. In it he painted the picture of a man of naïveté, humour, gentleness and total commitment to an art of whose importance he was utterly convinced. The version printed here is the final revision. An introduction by Nancy Ireson sets the Recollections in context.