Laura Gascoigne reviews Théodore Rousseau: Unruly Nature at the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, Copenhagen, on view through January 8, 2017.

Gascoigne begins “The CVs of great artists are seldom studded with successes, and sometimes their failures are more consequential. If the young Théodore Rousseau had won the Prix de Rome in 1829, he would have travelled to Italy and probably returned as an academic painter of classical landscapes in the tradition of Claude. Having failed to win it, he travelled the length and breadth of France before settling at Barbizon near the Forest of Fontainebleau and becoming a progressive painter of nature.”