Roger de la Fresnaye

Private Collection, France
Acquired from the above by the present owner in 2002

Le Mans, Musée de Tessé; Barcelona, Picasso Museum, Roger de La Fresnaye, Cubisme et Tradition, 2005, no. 94.

Very good condition. Work has been recently cleaned. Slight buckling to canvas in the upper left corner. Some slight unevenness in the pigment in the yellow square to the right and in the red square to the left of center. Hairline cracks are visible in the black square at top and in the darkest pigments of the table and the wine glass's shadow. Under UV light, original pigments fluoresce. A few strokes of inpainting at upper left corner to cover frame abrasion and a few strokes in center of yellow rectangle.
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According to Françoise Lucbert, "The different angles of approach on the theme of 'La Table Louis Philipe' translate into an essentialist study where the principles of cubist still life are mastered with such virtuosity that they aspire to a unity worthy of the masters of the past..., and the series thus witnesses the disappearance of objects - bottles, glasses, books, etc - leaving the tray surrounded by the frame of the table which in turn supports several superimposed coloured geometric forms." (Roger de La Fresnaye, Cubisme et tradition (exhibition catalogue), Le Mans & Barcelona, 2005, p. 113).

The present work is a step towards the long process of abstraction which was at the heart of the artist's research. As was his habit, La Fresnaye proceeded with rigor and created several preparatory studies. He was drawn to the creation of complex compositions mixing common objects found in his studio with rectangular forms of various colors. This process, derived from collage, generates an abstract style similar to the figurative system of his oeuvre as a whole.

 

Fig. I  Georges Braque, Le Guéridon, 1929, oil on canvas, The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.