George Rodrigue was an American artist born in New Iberia, Louisiana in 1944, whose work became one of the most recognizable and beloved bodies of art in contemporary American culture. Trained at the Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles and later in France, Rodrigue returned to Louisiana with a deep commitment to capturing the landscape, people, and mythology of his Cajun heritage. His early paintings depicted the moss-draped oaks and weathered figures of the Atchafalaya Basin with a haunting, flattened style rooted in both folk tradition and European modernism.

In 1984, Rodrigue introduced the Blue Dog — a spectral, wide-eyed blue canine derived from the Cajun legend of the loup-garou and inspired by his own Tiffany, a small terrier mix. What began as a Halloween image evolved into a global icon. The Blue Dog appeared against vivid, flat fields of color in compositions that were at once playful and melancholic, accessible and deeply personal. The image resonated far beyond Louisiana, earning Rodrigue international recognition and a devoted collector base spanning fine art, pop culture, and everything in between.

Rodrigue's prints and limited editions — produced with meticulous attention to color and craft — are among the most collectible works in American contemporary art. He died in New Orleans in 2013, leaving behind a legacy as distinctly American as jazz and as visually arresting as the Louisiana landscape that shaped him.