GEORGES BRAQUE | Fruits, cruche et pipe

Mr & Mrs Cummins Catherwood, Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania (acquired by 1963)
Galerie D. Benador, Geneva
Private Collection, Europe (acquired circa 1965; sale: Christie's, London, 25th June 2008, lot 469)
Purchased at the above sale by the present owner

Paris, Galerie Charpentier, Nature Mortes Françaises, 1951, n.n.
Philadelphia, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia Collects 20th Century, n.n., 1963, illustrated in the catalogue

George Isarlov, Catalogue des œuvres de Georges Braque, Paris, 1932, no. 349
John Russell, Braque, London, 1959, no. 34, illustrated p. 123
Galerie Maeght (ed.), Catalogue de l'œuvre de Georges Braque, Peintures 1924-1927, Paris, 1968, n.n., illustrated p. 14
Massimo Carrà, Tout l'œuvre peint de Braque, 1908-1929, Paris, 1973, no. 217, illustrated p. 96

Oil on cradled panel; the panel is sound. There is a varnish preventing UV light from fully penetrating, however examination under UV reveals no apparent signs of retouching. There are a few intermittent pinholes along the edges. There are several horizontal hairline cracks in the support, entirely stable, and there are a few scattered scuffs along the extreme edges, which are not visible when framed. This work is in overall good condition.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Still life was a theme that George Braque consistently returned to during his long and productive career. Having recovered from a head wound inflicted during the fighting at Carency during the First World War, Braque resumed painting in 1917, and during the early 1920s, achieved well-deserved, if belated success. As it had been during his Cubist year's, still life was the artist’s primary theme, which he deemed the most appropriate subject for his investigations of the formal and tactile qualities of painting. Braque’s still lifes from the 1920s effortlessly combine the French nature morte tradition with the new pictorial language developed from cubism and arguably represent the quintessence of his œuvre. Humble in theme, Braque demonstrates his unaffected relish for the pleasures of simple bourgeois living by depicting unassuming objects of the everyday. Depicting fruit, a pipe and a jug in the present work, Braque described his painterly goal as exploring “how far one can go in blending volume and colour” (quoted in Jean Leymarie, Georges Braque (exhibition catalogue), The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, 1988, p. 27). The formal elements of the still life have been rendered as flattened shapes that act as ‘signs’ for the objects they represent, as in cubist practice. Spatial depth is created by the contrast of the white pipe against the darker forms that lie behind it, and the bright yellow lemons that resonate strongly from the work. Conveying a tangible space, it is an image of casual intimacy, enhanced by the horizontal format the artist has employed, allowing him to disperse the focal points of the composition. As Isabelle Monod-Fontaine has written, 'nobody else succeeded as he did in transforming a table covered with objects into a mental space, a cerebral as well as a visual stimulus' (quoted in Georges Braque: Order and Emotion, (exhibition catalogue), Museum of Contemporary Art, Andros, 2003, p.19).