Pouls fievreux de l'ombre
1959
Image not available — this artwork is under copyright
View on museum website →Medium
color lithograph
Classification
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. N. Richard Miller
Accession Number
1971.84.38
Art Historical Context
Jean Dubuffet's *Pouls fievreux de l* (Feverish Pulses of the Shadow), vivid color lithograph from 1959, captures the artist's raw, instinctive energy. Dubuffet, a French painter and printmaker (1901–1985), championed *Art Brut*—or "raw art"—celebrating unpolished creativity from outsiders to the art world. Created in the post-World War II era, when Dubuffet was exploring textured, graffiti-like forms, this work exemplifies his rejection of academic refinement in favor of primal, childlike vigor. As a lithograph, the piece highlights the medium's versatility for bold colors and intricate text...
About the Artist
Jean Dubuffet
Jean Dubuffet (1901–1985) was a French painter and sculptor born into a prosperous family of wholesale wine merchants in Le Havre. His early life revolved around this bourgeois world, with childhood friendships among writers like Raymond Queneau and Georges Limbour shaping his intellectual circle. In 1918, at age 17, he moved to Paris to study painting at the Académie Julian but departed after jus...