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拍品专文
Helene Schjerfbeck painted still lifes throughout her career. Her earliest still life, Onions, was painted in Pont-Aven in 1883/4, but it was in the 1910s that her style changed considerably as she came under the influence of other contemporary European artists, in particular Paul Cézanne and Juan Gris. H. Ahtela, Schjerfbeck's biographer, writes 'Stenman visits Hyvinge anew in the summer of 1914. He arrives directly from Paris, where he had been living on the 'right side' of the Seine near St. Germain. He remarks jokingly that he brings greetings from Holbein, additionally he shows her some new acquisitions he has made, a Marie Laurencin, a Juan Gris, six paintings by Finnish artists. An etching by Rembrandt, which he had bought on the quais of Paris, he had already sold to the Art Society, an Eckersberg that went to Copenhagen.
'Helene reflects a lot on these paintings and writes to Maria (Wiik) about them: 'I have been watching Gris for a week now, the creation of a Spanish cubist, a still life in blue, violet and pink. I now begin to understand their way to handle the matter. They put one impression upon the next. An expressionist drawing by Laurencin, much grace, but less important than the one in Ord och Bild (a magazine), which I liked so much ... However, I believe that cubism will have a certain impact on art (I also like the Japanese perspective) but don't see a road for it to develop along.
'She searches for reproductions of her old idols from the first years in Paris. Even the apples by Cézanne is still among them, Sisley's poppies, Pissarro's crowded streets, Raffaelli, a little dry in his perfection ...' (H. Ahtela, Helene Schjerfbeck, 1953, p. 106).
'Schjerfbeck's still lifes were no longer a conventional study of inanimate objects, but rather the artist's personal concept of light and colour. Her approach had also changed technically: the importance of colour finds expression in her use of the palette knife, no longer to depict the material of the subject but to organise the whole basic structure of the picture. Her use of oil paint and tempera had also changed: instead of depicting texture and material structure of the objects in the still life, she starts to express the specific character and intensity of the colour.' (Helmiriitta Sariola 'Nature morte' in the catalogue of the exhibition Helene Schjerfbeck at the Finnish National Gallery Ateneum, 1992, p. 87.)
Schjerfbeck painted two important still lifes in 1915, The Red Apples (fig. 1) and the present work, Still Life with Fruit. Helmiriitta Sarioli loc. cit. writes, 'The other still life showing red apples on a white place, Still Life with Fruit, from the same period has an empty pale blue background and foreground which provide a wonderful framework for the contrast between the forward-moving force of the warm red apples and the static, cold colour of the green fruit (sic.) in the background'.
It is probable that Still Life with Fruit was painted before The Red Apples, just after Stenman's visit in the summer of 1914. In addition, Reuter (H. Ahtela) records that Schjerfbeck was working on The Red Apples when he visited her in Hyvinge in March 1915.
Still Life with Fruit and The Red Apples are the first examples in which a strong, vibrant real colour has been used and are exceptionally cheerful works. This perhaps reflect her growing artistic confidence, especially as in the previous autumn the Finnish Art Society had commissioned self-portraits of the nine leading Finnish artists, including Schjerfbeck.
'Helene reflects a lot on these paintings and writes to Maria (Wiik) about them: 'I have been watching Gris for a week now, the creation of a Spanish cubist, a still life in blue, violet and pink. I now begin to understand their way to handle the matter. They put one impression upon the next. An expressionist drawing by Laurencin, much grace, but less important than the one in Ord och Bild (a magazine), which I liked so much ... However, I believe that cubism will have a certain impact on art (I also like the Japanese perspective) but don't see a road for it to develop along.
'She searches for reproductions of her old idols from the first years in Paris. Even the apples by Cézanne is still among them, Sisley's poppies, Pissarro's crowded streets, Raffaelli, a little dry in his perfection ...' (H. Ahtela, Helene Schjerfbeck, 1953, p. 106).
'Schjerfbeck's still lifes were no longer a conventional study of inanimate objects, but rather the artist's personal concept of light and colour. Her approach had also changed technically: the importance of colour finds expression in her use of the palette knife, no longer to depict the material of the subject but to organise the whole basic structure of the picture. Her use of oil paint and tempera had also changed: instead of depicting texture and material structure of the objects in the still life, she starts to express the specific character and intensity of the colour.' (Helmiriitta Sariola 'Nature morte' in the catalogue of the exhibition Helene Schjerfbeck at the Finnish National Gallery Ateneum, 1992, p. 87.)
Schjerfbeck painted two important still lifes in 1915, The Red Apples (fig. 1) and the present work, Still Life with Fruit. Helmiriitta Sarioli loc. cit. writes, 'The other still life showing red apples on a white place, Still Life with Fruit, from the same period has an empty pale blue background and foreground which provide a wonderful framework for the contrast between the forward-moving force of the warm red apples and the static, cold colour of the green fruit (sic.) in the background'.
It is probable that Still Life with Fruit was painted before The Red Apples, just after Stenman's visit in the summer of 1914. In addition, Reuter (H. Ahtela) records that Schjerfbeck was working on The Red Apples when he visited her in Hyvinge in March 1915.
Still Life with Fruit and The Red Apples are the first examples in which a strong, vibrant real colour has been used and are exceptionally cheerful works. This perhaps reflect her growing artistic confidence, especially as in the previous autumn the Finnish Art Society had commissioned self-portraits of the nine leading Finnish artists, including Schjerfbeck.