The Sleeping Gypsy is an 1897 oil-on-canvas by the French
Naïve artist
Henri Rousseau. It is a fantastical depiction of a lion musing over a sleeping woman on a moonlit night. Rousseau first exhibited the painting at the 13th
Salon des Indépendants, and tried unsuccessfully to sell it to the mayor of his hometown,
Laval. It instead entered the private collection of a Parisian charcoal merchant, where it remained until 1924, when it was discovered by the art critic Louis Vauxcelles. The Paris-based art dealer
Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler purchased the painting in 1924, although a controversy arose over whether the painting was a forgery. It was acquired by art historian
Alfred H. Barr Jr. for the
Museum of Modern Art in New York, where it remains.
Painting credit: Henri Rousseau