Shop art print and framed art Still life with Apples by Paul Cézanne

Still Life with Apples (French: Nature morte aux pommes) is a painting by Paul Cézanne (1839-1906) in the Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg. It is a still life painted in the Impressionist style. The red apples on a white plate and the two green apples behind a lemon give red and green dominance to this painting on a yellow background. These two dominant colours have been used in a large number of Delacroix's still lifes, which Cézanne particularly appreciated.1 Cézanne had already tried them out in various compositions with apples, such as the Still Life with Apples and Pears (1885-1887) in the National Gallery of Art, Washington, from which he drew inspiration for this painting. On the left is a small cylindrical metal box that contrasts with the rounded shapes of the fruit and the plate, partially covered with a green leaf. This object is used here for the first and last time in Cézanne's work. It is therefore an investigation of forms and contrasts of tones which is related to the synthetism of that period. As Émile Bernard wrote in his Memoirs,2 Cézanne had declared that "all the forms of nature can be reduced to the sphere, the cylinder and the cone, and that is why the artist must first of all study these simple figures, and it is only then that he can do what he likes". This still life was acquired by Otto Krebs in Munich from the Hugo Perls gallery. It was transferred to the Hermitage in 1947 by the Soviet occupation authorities, as reparation for war damage, and [...]

 

This artwork is a painting from the modern period. It belongs to the post-impressionism style.

 

« Still life with Apples » is kept at State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia.

 

Find the full description of Still life with Apples by Paul Cézanne on Wikipedia.