Henri Rousseau – Eve and the Serpent

Eve and the Serpent is a painting by Henri Rousseau, oil on canvas, dated by the Hamburger Kunsthalle to about 1906–1907. The original is 62 cm high and 46 cm wide and is held by the Hamburger Kunsthalle in Hamburg under inventory number HK-2992, on permanent loan from the Stiftung Hamburger Kunstsammlungen. What you see: a nude Eve in profile, her hair falling past her hips, taking a round orange fruit from a blue-green serpent coiled round a slender tree, in a dense green paradise under a pink evening sky.

Eve and the Serpent

What is on the canvas?

The canvas is upright and almost entirely green: ferns, palm fronds and spiky, agave-like leaves fill it from edge to edge, and a strip of pink and pale blue sky shows through the leaves at the top. Eve stands right of centre in profile, facing left, her long dark brown hair falling down her back past her hips. She holds out her right hand, and a blue-green serpent with a pink underside, coiled round a thin dark trunk at the left, offers her a round orange fruit in its mouth. Above the serpent a small tree bears the same orange fruit, and a few more lie on the ground at Eve’s feet. A tall dark trunk closes the right edge. The signature, Henri Rousseau, is at the lower right. The museum reads the scene as the moment of the Fall: Eve reaches for the fruit the serpent offers her, and Adam, who normally belongs to the scene, is not there. Another Eve by Rousseau, held in Japan, is Eve in the Garden of Eden.

Did Rousseau ever see a jungle?

Not by his own account. The museum’s text quotes Rousseau as saying he had never travelled further than the hothouses of the botanical garden in Paris, yet by 1910 he had made more than twenty jungle paintings. His models, the same text says, came from those hothouses and from ethnographic magazines with photographs of exotic animals and landscapes, assembled into what it calls painted jungle collages. Here the jungle is the garden of paradise: the museum names the ferns, agaves, palms and rubber trees around Eve. The first painting of the series, in the National Gallery in London, is the one we offer as Tiger in a Tropical Storm.

Who owned the painting before Hamburg?

The museum publishes a detailed chain of owners and says openly where it has gaps: it is not yet known when, how and to whom Rousseau himself sold or gave the painting. The first owner it can name is the Paris collector Wilhelm Uhde, around 1912; then Léonce and Paul Rosenberg in Paris in 1913, from whom Paul and Charlotte von Mendelssohn-Bartholdy of Berlin bought it, keeping it until 1927. It stayed with Paul von Mendelssohn-Bartholdy and his wife Elsa until 1935 and with Elsa until 1948, when the Galerie Dr. Fritz Nathan and the dealer Christoph Bernoulli, of St. Gallen and Basel, bought it in equal shares. In September 1956 it was bought by the foundation now called the Stiftung Hamburger Kunstsammlungen, which has lent it permanently to the Kunsthalle ever since. The places are where the owners lived or traded. The same Berlin couple, Paul von Mendelssohn Bartholdy and his wife Elsa, also appear in the ownership record of Tropical Forest with Monkeys.

How large is the original, and what does that mean on a wall?

The original is 62 cm high and 46 cm wide, smaller than every size we offer. Ten sizes are available: 55 x 70, 58 x 75, 64 x 81, 70 x 92, 74 x 96, 77 x 107, 87 x 110, 90 x 120, 97 x 127 and 107 x 135 cm. The smallest, 55 x 70 cm, is 9 cm wider and 8 cm taller than the original; 90 x 120 cm keeps its proportion most closely. Eve takes up more than half the height of the canvas, so even the small sizes carry her clearly, while the larger ones also bring out the serpent’s pattern and the fruit. An upright format like this suits a narrow wall, a bedroom or a stairwell. Custom sizes are ordered through the made-to-order painting page.

How is a hand-painted reproduction made?

Every canvas painting is made by hand in oils when you order it, in the size you choose. Working from a high-resolution image of the original, the painter builds up the forest in layers and keeps Eve’s skin and the orange fruit as the brightest notes against the green, as they are in the original. Painting by hand leaves every canvas slightly different from any other, which is the plainest difference between a painting and a print. The canvas is stretched on a wooden frame and ready for the wall. Another Rousseau with snakes that we offer is The Snake Charmer, and the whole collection is in the Henri Rousseau gallery.

Frequently asked questions

Where is the original kept?

In the Hamburger Kunsthalle in Hamburg, inventory number HK-2992, on permanent loan from the Stiftung Hamburger Kunstsammlungen since 1956.

Is the fruit an apple?

The museum’s text calls it the apple of the Fall. On the canvas it is round and orange, like the fruit on the small tree above the serpent, and that is how we describe it.

When was it painted?

The museum dates it to about 1906–1907. The only inscription the museum records on the canvas is the signature, with no year.

Is this a print?

No. It is painted by hand in oils, and the layers of paint can be seen and felt.

Is the painting suitable as a gift?

It can be, for someone who loves Rousseau’s jungles; bear in mind that Eve is nude. If you are unsure, a gift voucher leaves the choice to the recipient.

• Subject: a nude Eve in profile takes an orange fruit from a blue-green serpent in a dense green paradise under a pink sky.
• Original: oil on canvas, 62 x 46 cm (height x width), Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg, inv. HK-2992; about 1906–1907.
• Our version: hand-painted oil, ten sizes from 55 x 70 to 107 x 135 cm, or a size made to order.
• Of note: the museum’s ownership record states its gaps openly and traces a chain from Wilhelm Uhde to the Hamburg foundation that bought the painting in 1956.