Henri Lebasque was born in Champigné, France, and studied in Paris at the École des Beaux-Arts and in the studio of academic painter Léon Bonnat. He exhibited regularly at the Paris Salon, but also maintained close relationships with younger painters, especially Vuillard and Bonnard.

In 1903, Lebasque—alongside Georges Rouault, André Derain, Henri Matisse, and Albert Marquet—founded the Salon d’Automne in reaction to the conservative policies of the official Paris Salon. The exhibition quickly became a major platform for innovation in twentieth-century painting and sculpture. In 1905, it witnessed the emergence of Fauvism, when critics, reacting disparagingly to the boldly colored canvases of Matisse, Derain, Marquet, Maurice de Vlaminck, Kees van Dongen, and Charles Camoin, coined the label fauves (“wild beasts”) for the group.

In 1924, Lebasque moved to Le Cannet on the French Riviera, where he and his friend Bonnard shared a manikin for their studies. Celebrated by both critics and fellow artists as “the painter of joy and light,” he was admired for the intimacy of his subjects and the distinctive luminosity of his palette. Lebasque remained there until his death in 1937.