"Self-taught, self-confident, and inscrutable, Henri Rousseau was "a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma," to crib Winston Churchill's famous characterization of Russia. He began painting before retiring as a toll collector for the city of Paris in 1893. It was at this point that he became a professional, though impoverished, artist. The title A Painter's Secrets is not a ploy."
"Visitors with a deerstalker mindset may experience frissons of amazement when scrutinizing the paintings in the galleries. It's startling to discover the top section of the four-year-old Eiffel Tower in the distant background of " Sawmill, Outskirts of Paris" (1893-95), one of the small works that the enterprising painter sold to his neighbors. Other surprises are eerie. Sheltered within a barely visible structure in "Carnival Evening"(1886), a disembodied head spies on a pair of costumed revelers."
Henri Rousseau's paintings, including "Sleeping Gypsy" and "The Family," appear alongside nearly sixty works that illustrate his range and mystery. Curators Christopher Green and Nancy Ireson contextualize many pieces with Rousseau's personal history and life before he turned professional after retiring as a Paris toll collector in 1893. Conservators conducted technical studies that exposed long-obscured, nuanced colors and surface details. Close viewing uncovers surprising elements such as the Eiffel Tower in the background of "Sawmill, Outskirts of Paris" and a hidden disembodied head in "Carnival Evening." The catalog enlarges specific details to underscore Rousseau's sharp observational skills.
Read at Hyperallergic
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