Jean Dubuffet was born on 31 July 1901 at Le Havre, France. In 1918 he moved to Paris to attend classes at the Académie Julian, but left after six months. In 1923-24 he travelled to Italy, then South America, and gave up painting, supporting himself first as an industrial draughtsman and then entering the family wine business. Except briefly, in the years 1934-37, Dubuffet did not resume painting again full-time until 1942. In 1944 his first solo exhibition was held at the Galerie René Drouin, Paris, and in 1947 the first of many solo exhibitions was held at Pierre Matisse Gallery, New York. From 1945 he collected 'Art Brut', the art of primitive societies and the insane, and in 1949, on the occasion of an 'Art Brut' exhibition at the Galerie René Drouin, he published an essay, L'Art Brut préféré aux Arts Culturels. From 1955 he spent a great deal of time at Vence, in the south of France. Dubuffet received his first museum retrospective at the Schloss Morsbroich, Leverkusen, Germany, in 1957 and in the 1960s there were a number of major retrospectives, notably at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris (1960-61), at the Museum of Modern Art, New York (1962) and, in 1966, at the Tate Gallery, London, the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York. In 1962 he began working on a series called 'L'Hourloupe' that was to preoccupy him for a decade. In 1972 he completed a monumental sculpture commission, Groupe de quatre arbres (Group of four trees) in the style of 'L'Hourloupe' for chase Manhattan Plaza, New York. He donated his 'Art Brut' collection to the city of Lausanne in 1976, inaugurating the Musée de l'Art Brut. On the occasion of his eightieth birthday in 1981 a large exhibition of his work was held at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York. Dubuffet died in Paris on 12 May 1985.