French painter

Autumnal woodland landscape

Oil on canvas signed lower right 

Dimensions: 84 x 88 cm

Composition with an impressionist and free touch, the painter adorns the canvas with bronze and salmon colors. He treats the painting like a sketch; paints that moment of life when the interior of a wood is blown with a light wind. It represents the bed of a river and, in the distance, a bridge. Dark colors give extra depth and soul.

Henry Lerolle trained at the Académie de Charles Suisse then entered the Paris School of Fine Arts in Louis Lamothe's studio. He began at the Salon of 1868. He exhibited regularly at the National Society of Fine Arts where he obtained many distinctions, including a gold medal in 1900.

Henry Lerolle surrounds himself with artists whose works he collects, musicians and writers such as Degas, Monet, Renoir, Maurice Denis, Gustave Moreau. Amateur violinist and composer, it was through his wife, Madeleine Escudier, that he was introduced to contemporary music. He became a friend of Claude Debussy and established relationships with Henri Dupais, Sergei Prokofiev, Maurice Ravel and Igor Stravinsky. 

His two daughters married the sons of his friend the industrialist and collector Henri Rouart. They pose for Edgard Degas, Renoir, Maurice Denis or even Albert Besnard.