Scouts Attacked by a Tiger (Éclaireurs attaqués par un tigre)

Henri Rousseau, the self-taught Sunday painter known as 'Le Douanier,' produced his dense jungle fantasies with no direct knowledge of actual tropical vegetation — his sources were the Paris botanical gardens, illustrated publications, and his powerful imagination. This 1904 canvas of scouts attacked by a tiger belongs to his series of exotic jungle paintings that began around 1891 and culminated in 'The Dream' of 1910. Rousseau's jungles became enormously influential among the Surrealists, who recognized in his naive directness a visionary quality untouched by academic convention. The work is at the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia.

Rousseau layers dense, stylized vegetation in flat, interlocking planes that create a shallow, tapestry-like space rather than convincing depth. The tiger and scouts are placed with the direct, frontal clarity of a child's drawing. His palette is saturated and unmodulated: vivid greens, bright oranges, clean blacks.