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The National Museum Jean-Jacques Henner, in its very private Parisian mansion, presents a superb exhibition devoted to red hair and its symbolism in art, literature and culture. A hundred works, some of them unpublished, trace a flamboyant journey through paintings, sketches, posters, photographs and toys.
Punctuated, accentuated, marked, this rare color is often associated with the imaginary and prejudices; it has always aroused ambiguous reactions between fascination and repulsion.
Mythical, the redhead is portrayed as a femme fatale, seductive with hot charms, sensual blood but also as a dangerous creature, witch treachery whose hair calls the flames of the stake.
Throughout history, redheads are magnificent and rebellious accursed.
Jean-Jacques Henner Madeleine, about 1885,
© RMN-Grand Palais / Franck Raux
