Gustave-Henri Jossot

French painter

Gustave Henri Jossot, also known as Abdul Karim Jossot (Dijon, France, 16 April 1866 – Sidi Bou Said, Tunisia, 7 April 1951), was a French caricaturist, illustrator, poster designer, Orientalist painter, writer and thinker.

Jossot started his career under the guidance of Jean Paul Laurens and Eugène Carrière. His style as a cartoonist is immediately recognizable for its expressive reference to the Cloisonnism introduced by Émile Bernard. He travelled in Brittany and may have been influenced by the Pont Aven school. He is mainly remembered for the mark he left on several special issues of Paris journals, most notably l'Assiette au beurre, contributors to which included Kees van Dongen, Félix Vallotton, František Kupka, Steinlen, Adolphe Willette, and Jacques Villon. Much of his work lampooned the bourgeoisie, as can be seen from the titles of the illustrated books he produced: Artistes et Bourgeois (Paris: Louis Michaud 1896); Jockey Club Sardines (1897); Minces de trognes (Paris: Hazard, 1896); Viande de Bourgeois (Paris: Louis Michaud, 1906). His work was shown at several major collective exhibitions in Paris: Salon des Cent (1894, 1895) Salon de la Société Nationale de Beaux Arts (1895); Salon d'Automne (1908, 1909, 1911); Salon des Indépendants (1894, 1896, 1910, 1911, 1921). His big exhibition in the Rudolphinum Muséum established his international stature in 1908, then in the Salon Tunisien of 1912. Although Jossot often said he had stopped all his artistics activities, he was still sending his works to the Salon Tunisien the day of his death. At public auction in New York (12 June 1980) a painting of Jossot's was sold with the remarkable title "Anti Nabis" (ref: Bénézit 1999). This work, dated 1894, refers to Les Nabis, an important influence at the time.