Grapes and Walnuts on a Table
Alfred Sisley
(British (active in France), 1839–1899)
1876
Country of Origin, for CustomsEngland
Medium/TechniqueOil on canvas
Dimensions38.1 x 55.2 cm (15 x 21 3/4 in.)
Credit LineBequest of John T. Spaulding
Accession number48.601
On View
Not on viewClassificationsPaintings
Collections
It was likely at Monet’s suggestion that Sisley undertook this still life—one of just nine he ever painted. With its inventory of fruit, plate, walnuts, knife, and nutcracker, the modest composition exhibits all the hallmarks of an Impressionist picture, painted from life and in natural light. Ranged across the snowy expanse of the tablecloth—its topography of creases rendered with brisk strokes of blue and white—these objects almost take on the character of a landscape, Sisley’s more accustomed genre.
InscriptionsLower left: SisleyProvenanceOctober 1, 1881, sold by the artist to Durand-Ruel, Paris [see note 1]; January 2, 1925, sold by Durand-Ruel, New York, to John Taylor Spaulding (b. 1870 - d. 1948), Boston; 1948, bequest of John Taylor Spaulding to the MFA. (Accession Date: June 3, 1948)NOTES:
[1] According to a letter from E.C. Holston of Durand-Ruel, New York to John Taylor Spaulding (November 11, 1924), "the old gentleman Mr. Durand-Ruel [probably Paul Durand-Ruel, 1831 - 1922] purchased it direct from Sisley about fifty years ago and it has been in his private collection all during his lifetime." François Daulte, Alfred Sisley: Catalogue Raisonné de l'oeuvre peint (Lausanne, 1959), cat. no. 233, gives the date of sale from Sisley to Durand-Ruel as October 1, 1888 and the date of sale from Durand-Ruel to Spaulding as February 6, 1925. The painting was exhibited by Durand-Ruel galleries (in Paris and New York) between 1899 and 1923.
Alfred von Wierusz-Kowalski
Alfred Stevens
