Camille Pissarro (1830-1903)

When Pissarro was unable to work out of doors he worked in his studio (fig. 1) painting still-lives and portraits; as an unframed studio piece this is a very rare work for 1902. Of the still-lifes Pissarro painted, he particularly favoured flowers. John Rewald has written that a possible reason for this was that 'the artist's wife was extremely fond of flowers. In the early days of their life together she had even worked for a florist to earn whatever she could. Later, she always grew masses of flowers in her gardens; among them, her greatest pride were pink peonies. No wonder then that she often gathered bouquets for the still lifes of her husband and that these...would feature peonies of various shades, but especially pink'. (J. Rewald, Camille Pissarro, New York, [1963], p. 90). Another bouquet of flowers painted in 1873 (P. & V. 198) also shows Pissarro's liking for subtle gradations, pinks and whites interspersed with green leaves. Commenting on the 1873 bouquet, but equally appropriate to the present work, Rewald has written: 'The artist apparently sought for the most delicate nuances rather than for bright dominant tones' (ibid, p. 90).