The Plate of Apples

about 1877

Paul Cezanne
French, 1839-1906

This is one of several still lifes by Paul Cézanne showing the ocher wallpaper with blue lozenge-shaped motifs that was in his apartment on the rue de l’Ouest in Paris. The work’s early date is reinforced by the thickly applied paint, which is so different from the thin washes of pigments that the artist would use in his canvases in the 1880s and 1890s. The surface of the work was sculpted almost as much as painted. Around the apples, for instance, Cézanne used a palette knife or the end of his brush to incise contours.

Status: On View, Regenstein Hall
Department: Painting and Sculpture of Europe

Artist: Paul Cezanne
Title: The Plate of Apples
Place: France (Object made in)
Date: 1872–1882
Medium: Oil on canvas
Inscriptions: Inscribed lower right: P.Cezanne
Dimensions: 18 1/8 × 21 1/2 in. (45.8 × 54.7 cm)
Credit Line: Gift of Kate L. Brewster
Reference Number: 1949.512
IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world. Learn more.: https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/65811/manifest.json

Trublot [Paul Alexis], “La Collection Murer,” Le Cri du people (October 21, 1887), no. 7.
Katalog der Modernen Galerie Heinrich Thannhauser (Munich 1916), p. 30 (ill.).
The Dial 81 (1926), p. 359.
Kurt Pfister, Cézanne: Gestalt, Werk, Mythos (Potsdam, 1927), pl. 76.
Eugenio d’Ors, Paul Cézanne (Paris, 1930), pl. 23.
Lionello Venturi, Cézanne, son art, son oeuvre (Paris, 1936), no. 210.
R. Goldwater in Art News Annual (March 1938), p. 158 (ill.).
Daniel Catton Rich, “The Kate L. Brewster Bequest,” Bulletin of the Art Institute of Chicago 44, 3 (1950), p. 51
The Art Institute of Chicago, A Brief Guide to the Collections (Chicago, 1956), p. 36.
Kurt Badt, Die Kunst Cézannes (Munich 1956), p. 123.
P. Gachet, Deux Amis des impressionistes–Le Dr. Gachet et Murer (Paris, 1956), p. 171.
L. Gowing in Burlington Magazine (June 1956), p. 188.
The Art Institute of Chicago, Paintings in the Art Institute of Chicago: A Catalogue of the Picture Collection (Chicago, 1961), p. 71.
Frederick A. Sweet, “Great Chicago Collectors,” Apollo 84 (September 1966), p. 203.
Richard Shiff in Critical Inquiry (Summer 1978), fig. 12.
Richard Shiff, Cézanne and the End of Impressionism (Chicago, 1984), p. 209, fig. 48.
Michael Howard, Cézanne (London, 1990), p. 73 (ill.)
John Rewald, The Paintings of Paul Cézanne: A Catalogue Raisonné (New York, 1996), vol. 1, p. 223, no. 328, vol. 2, p. 105.
The Age of Impressionism at the Art Institute of Chicago (New Haven and London, 2008), cat. 34, p. 82 (ill.).
Rpbert Storr, “La Famille Cezanne,” Cézanne and Beyond, Exh, cat (Philadelphia Museum of Art, 2009), Fig 2.4, p. 48, p. 50.
Achim Borchardt-Hume, Gloria Groom, Caitlin Haskell and Natalia Sidlina, eds., Cezanne, exh. cat. (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2022), 52-53, 59n33, 104 cat. 33.

Berlin, Galerie Thannhauser, Erste Sonderausstellung, January 9-mid-February, 1927, cat. 14 (ill.).
Chicago, Mr. and Mrs. S. Brewster residence, The Walter S. Brewster Collection, January 20-22, 1933, cat. 6.
New York, Museum of Modern Art, Fruit and the Flower Paintings, May 13-31, 1933.
New York, Marie Harriman Gallery, Chardin and the Modern Still Life, November 1936, cat. 12.
Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Coe College, Centennial Exhibition, May 15-June 9, 1952, cat. 14.
New York, Fine Arts Associates, Cézanne: Rarely Shown Works, November 10-29, 1952, cat. 4 (ill.).
Aix-en-Provence, Musée Granet, Cézanne: Peintures, Aquarelles, Dessins, July 5-August 5, 1953, cat. 21, traveled to Nice, Musée Massena, August 8-Spetember 10, 1953 and Grenoble, Musée des Beaux-Arts, September 15-October 6.
Worcester Museum of Art, The Dial and the Dial Collection, April 30-September 8, 1959, cat. 10.
Memphis, Tenn., Dixon Gallery and Gardens, Impressionists in 1877: A Loan Exhibition, December 4, 1977-January 8, 1978, cat. 8 (ill.).
Albi, Musée Toulouse-Lautrec, Trésors impressionnistes du Musée de Chicago, June 27-August 31, 1980, cat. 33 (ill.).
Art Gallery of New South Wales, Classic Cézanne, November 28, 1998-February 28, 1999, cat. 9 (ill.).
New York, Museum of Modern Art, Pioneering Modern Painting: Cezanne and Pissarro 1865–1885, June 24-October 12, 2005, cat. 25; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, October 20, 2005-January 16, 2006; Musée d’Orsay, February 27-May 28, 2006.
Fort Worth, Tex., Kimbell Museum of Art, The Impressionists: Master Paintings from the Art Institute of Chicago, June 29–November 2, 2008, cat. 34 (ill.).
Paris, Musée Luxembourg, Cezanne et Paris, October 10, 2011-February 27, 2012.
Art Institute of Chicago, Cezanne, May 15-Sep. 5, 2022, cat. 33; London, Tate, Oct. 5, 2022-Mar. 12, 2023.

Eugène Murer, Pontoise [see Trublot 1887 and Rewald 1996]. Galerie Heinrich Thannhauser, Munich by 1916 [see Katalog der Modernen Galerie H. Thannhauser 1916]. F. Schoen, Berlin [based on information provided by P. Rosenberg and Co. in a letter to W. Brewster, dated February 25, 1930, copy in curatorial file]. Paul Cassirer, Berlin [according to Rewald 1996]. J. K. Thannhauser, Lucerne [according to Rewald 1996]. Paul Rosenberg and Co., New York by 1930 [see letter cited above]; sold to Walter S. Brewster, Chicago on February 15, 1930 [see letter citied above]; Mrs. Walter S. (Kate L.) Brewster; given to the Art Institute, 1949.

Rewald 328

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