|
Rousseau was an elderly amateur painter, who, for the sake of art, gave up his job. He exhibited unsuccessfully at the Salon des Indépendants, wrote music and plays, and kept a studio on Montmartre. By his very appearance, he epitomized a caustic parody of the traditional figure of "the Artist" rejected by the avant-garde. Early 20th-century rebels such as Matisse, Derain, and Picasso could not help but be impressed by the natural way in which Rousseau combined a faith in art with an abandonment of accepted conventions: perspective, chiaroscuro, poignant subject matter, and saccharine attractiveness.
|
