Marc Chagall

Galerie Maeght, Paris
Mr. Josef Rosensaft, New York
Acquavella Gallery, New York
Acquired from the above in 1968

André Pieyre de Mandiargues, Chagall, Paris, 1974, no. 100, illustrated p. 144

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Painted in 1961-64, Le Vase bleu aux deux corbeilles de fruits is a delightful and bountiful composition that combines several of Marc Chagall's most emblematic motifs with his passion for color. André Verdet describes: “Marc Chagall loved flowers. He delighted in their aroma, in contemplating their colors. For a long time, certainly after 1948 when he moved for good to the South of France after his wartime stay in the U.S., there were always flowers in his studio. In his work bouquets of flowers held a special place… Usually they created a sense of joy, but they could also reflect the melancholy of memories” (André Verdet quoted in Jacob Baal-Teshuva, ed., Chagall: A Retrospective, Fairfield, 1995, p. 347). Chagall was struck by the abundance of fruits and flowers in the French Riviera and he associated flowers with the landscape of France, claiming not to have known them during his humble upbringing in Russia. The splendor and luminosity of the Côte d’Azur also greatly influenced the artist’s palette, inspiring him to move towards bolder and brighter colors that are employed in the present work: the glorious red bouquet and cornucopias of bright green fruit on either side are depicted against a background bathed in a deep Mediterranean blue.

The composition is dominated by the vibrant energy of the magnificent still life in the foreground, allowing a double figure of lovers in the upper right corner to peacefully emerge from the soft, dreamlike atmosphere that pervades the rest of the canvas. Brides and grooms are a recurring theme within Chagall’s oeuvre throughout the span of his eighty-year career, and are often depicted as they are in the present work: the groom tenderly wraps his arms around his bride whose white dress, veil and flowers imply a certain innocence and purity. Chagall’s happy and powerful relationship with his first wife Bella had a great influence on his life and artistic career. The lovers and devoted souls connected in matrimony that appear frequently in Chagall’s works are inspired by his deep love for Bella, and often represent his own relationship. In fact, the motif of bouquets is also linked to Bella and their time spent together in France, as noted by Susan Tumarkin Goodman and Kenneth E. Silver: “His wife, Bella, brought home lavish bouquets from the markets, which Chagall transformed into lyrical expressions of joy. These are not traditional still lifes; rather, the bunches of blooms, enlarged out of all proportion, capture the spirit of nature, or perhaps the spirit of France and of Bella" (Susan Tumarkin Goodman & Kenneth E. Silver, Chagall: Love, War and Exile (exhibition catalogue), The Jewish Museum, New York, 2013-14, p. 25). This romantic still life is a celebration of the beauty and energy that Chagall discovered within the surroundings of the South of France, and assimilates several of his favorite motifs amidst the characteristically dreamlike setting that he skilfully conjures.