Odilon Redon

Andries Bonger (acquired from the artist in 1902)
Mme. Johanna van Gogh-Bonger, Amsterdam (acquired by descent from the above)
Vincent Wilhelm van Gogh, Laren, Holland (acquired by descent from the above)
Wildenstein & Co., New York
Acquired from the above on June 10, 1954

Rotterdam, Kunstzaal Reckers, Exposition de peintures, dessins, lithographies par Odilon Redon, 1907, no. 2
Amsterdam, Stedelijk Museum (on loan circa 1950)
New York, Wildenstein Gallery, Magic of Flowers in Painting for the Benefit of the Lenox Hill Neighborhood Association, 1954, no. 55
Amsterdam, Stedelijk Museum; Otterlo, Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller, Collectie Theo Van Gogh, 1960, no. 142 (catalogued incorrectly as pastel on paper)

Klaus Berger, Odilon Redon, Phantasie und Farbe, Cologne, 1964, no. 253, catalogued p. 200
Freek Heijbroek and Ester Wouthuysen, Kunst, kennis en commercie.  De kunsthandelaar J.H. de Bois (1878-1946), Amsterdam and Anvers, 1993, illustrated p. 105
F. Leeman and K. Sharp, "Vroege verzamelaars van Redon in Nederland, 1885-1900," Jong Holland, Amsterdam, 1994, no. 3, illustrated p. 40
Alec Wildenstein, Odilon Redon, Catalogue Raisonné de l'Oeuvre Peint et Dessiné,  vol. III, Paris, 1996, no. 1439, illustrated p. 67

Redon was happiest with his late work and believed that his nature paintings, both landscapes and floral still lifes, should define his artistic identity.  This picture, painted around 1900, is one of the best examples of the defining motif of his career.  Redon's most important patron, Andries Bonger, began collecting his works avidly at the turn of the century and owned several of his flower still lifes.  This particular painting was displayed in Bonger's residence in Amsterdam alongside paintings by van Gogh and Cézanne.  Such significant patronage only added to Redon's prestige and increased the demand for his still lifes. 

 

Painted in the last two decades of his life, Redon's flower still lifes are the culmination of a career spent perfecting this genre.  He had first explored this subject in the 1860s but then turned his attention to the developing Symbolist movement in the 1890s.  It was during this period that he became well known for his "noir" series-drawings which were quiet, obscure and emotionally dark in their subject matter and coloring.  It was from this that he developed his ethereal still lifes. "It was during the long formative period of his early 'noirs' that his attitudes towards art, his personal style and his ambitions evolved, laying the foundations for later developments" (Richard Hobbs, Odilon Redon, Boston, 1977, p. 31).  In changing the genre of his painting, Redon did not lose his Symbolist aesthetic, and he interpreted an otherwise common floral arrangement with a mystical aesthetic.  As Lawrence Gowing has observed, "Flowers (whose taste in color was so impeccable) were an esthetic program in themselves.  The abrupt spots of concentrated intensity, suspended by the arabesque of leaves against the limitless sky were a positive invitation to seek 'the blossoming forth of Dream' " (Lawrence Gowing, Odilon Redon, The Phillips Collection, Washington D.C., 1988, p. 3).