This delightful Cheshire-looking cat is a detail of Portrait of Pierre Loti, by 19th century French painter Henri Rousseau. Note the painterly brush strokes and simple palette. The strong contrast of the cat’s stripes, ears, and eyes against the man’s black suit make it seem to glow. The rest of the portrait is a composition with simplified shapes with few tones, and show’s the artist’s complete disregard of academic fundamentals. These traits are representative of what is known as Naïve Art.
When looking at the cat in the picture, you get the impression of a childlike art. “Simplicity” is the main word we’re looking for here: just enough lines and colors necessary. There is no worry of perspective, anatomical correctness, or true natural depiction. Only the most elementary techniques are used. Each leaf of the tree, and every window of the buildings are painstakingly painted, with no indication of the buidlings receeding as they would across a real landscape.
This style allows the artist to express imaginary, dream-like settings without having to consider scientific and natural accuracy. It’s no surprise that Henri Rousseau painted wild jungle scenes and parts of dreams from memory and imagination. There is a surreal quality to works like The Dream and The Snake Charmer.
Naïve Art is often overlapped with terms like Primitive Art and folk art. One of the most famous and beloved 19th century American folk artist is Anna Mary Robertson, known as Grandma Moses. Her charming portrayals of country life are still very popular today. Another Naïve painter is Horace Pippin, a 19th century painter from Pennsylvania, known for his folksy depictions of lower class African-American life.
The general idea is that artists classified as such have no formal training. This is not necessarily etched in stone, and moreso in recent years an artist can have training and choose to belong to Naïve Art as a school. However many of the early Naïve artists such as Rousseau were self-taught.
Also, Naïve art shouldn’t necessarily be confused with Outsider Art as it is a generally accepted style today. It is not anti-art, or anything like that but rather a charmingly simple painting style, which doesn’t have to be by the books to be good.
Comments are closed