Take a Picture …. Tiger in a Tropical Storm (Surprised!) Henri Rousseau, 1891 Rosmond Milner.

Take a Picture ….Take a Picture ….Take a Picture ….Take a Picture ….

Tiger in a Tropical Storm Tiger in a Tropical Storm (Surprised!)(Surprised!)

Henri Rousseau, 1891Henri Rousseau, 1891

Rosmond Rosmond MilnerMilner

First impressions First impressions countcount

describe the painting in ONE word

Look for clues in the pictureLook for clues in the picture

• Subject• Style• Composition• Colour• Mood

Looking at pictures: visual literacyLooking at pictures: visual literacy

• Subject

Is it formal, informal, a portrait, a landscape, a still-life, heroic, exotic, fantastic, ordinary/everyday?

Looking at pictures: visual literacyLooking at pictures: visual literacy

• Style

Is it naïve, childlike, primitive, stylised, bold, simplified, modern, classical?

Looking at pictures: visual literacyLooking at pictures: visual literacy

• Composition

Think about perspective, depth of view, pattern, diagonal lines, movement, rhythm, orientation (portrait or landscape format)?

Looking at pictures: visual literacyLooking at pictures: visual literacy

• Colour

Are the colours bright, warm, hot, strong, bold, complementary colours (red/green, purple/yellow, blue/orange); are there strong tonal contrasts?

Looking at pictures: visual literacyLooking at pictures: visual literacy

• Mood

Is the picture atmospheric, stormy, windy, light and dark, scary, exciting, electric, dramatic?

What can’t can’t we see?

What can’t we see in a reproduction?What can’t we see in a reproduction?

• Size• Texture > brush marks, thickness of paint• Support > canvas, wood, paper• If the colour reproduction is accurate

Art detectivesArt detectivesVisit these websites to find answers for the quiz about Visit these websites to find answers for the quiz about

the painting:the painting:

• www.nationalgallery.org.uk

The National Gallery.Click on Search then scroll down the page to Search the Collection. Type in Rousseau

• www.artchive.com

Mark Harden’s database of artists.Click on the Mona Lisa to enter the site and on H Rousseau in the index on the left. View the Image List

• www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/rousseau

The Web Museum, Paris

Art detectivesArt detectives

1. What was the painting first called?

2. When was it made?

3. Where can it be seen now?

4. In what way was the painting a first for Rousseau?

5. Which jungle inspired the painting?

1. Surprise!

2. 1891

3. The National Gallery, London

4. It was his first jungle painting

5. None – Rousseau claimed he served with the army in Mexico, but it was probably inspired by visits to the botanical gardens and zoo in Paris and by illustrated books

6. When was Rousseau born and when did he die?

7. What was his nickname and why?

8. Name one of his other famous paintings?

9. Why is Rousseau known as a naïve artist?

10. Which twentieth century art movement was influenced by his style of painting after his death?

6. 1844 – 1910

7. Le Douanier or Douanier Rousseau because he had been a low-ranking Customs Officer before he retired

8. The Dream, The Sleeping Gypsy, The Football Players

9. Because he was formally untrained and painted in a childlike or “primitive” way

10. Surrealism

Henri Rousseau, Le DouanierHenri Rousseau, Le Douanier

•

Self-portrait, Prague 1890

Rousseau’s timesRousseau’s times

Art movementsArt movements

• Impressionism

• Post Impressionism

• Fauvism

• Cubism

ArtistsArtists

• Picasso

• Cézanne

• Gaugin

• Monet

• Léger

• Dufy

Fact file on RousseauFact file on Rousseau

• He took 3 months to finish a painting working 7 days a week

• He painted slowly from the top to the bottom of the canvas, filling in just one colour at a time

Portrait of the poet Apollinaire

Fact file on RousseauFact file on Rousseau

• There are over 50 shades of green in a jungle painting

• He gave violin & painting lessons and was a street musician to eke out a living

• He died in poverty and had a pauper’s grave at first

Gentle Rousseau you can hear usWe salute you Delaunay, his wife, Monsieur Queval and I Let our luggage through the gate of heaven duty-free We’ll bring you paintbrushes, colours, canvassesSo that your heavenly leisure time in the real light Is devoted to painting as when you did my portrait The face of the stars

Guillaume Apollinaire

translated RKM

Rousseau’s grave now has an epitaph by Apollinaire

Famous quotes 1Famous quotes 1

about Cézanne, 1907

“ You know, I could have finished all these pictures”

Famous quotes 2Famous quotes 2

about Picasso, 1908

“ We are the two greatest painters of this era: you in the Egyptian style and I in the modern style”