Severin Roesen (German/American, 1815-1882). Fruit Still Life with Wine Glass and Compote. Oil on canvas. 30 x 25 inches...

Description

Severin Roesen (German/American, 1815-1882)
Fruit Still Life with Wine Glass and Compote
Oil on canvas
30 x 25 inches (76.2 x 63.5 cm)

PROVENANCE:
Private collection, New York.

In a letter dated March 15, 2024, the Severin Roesen scholar Judith Hansen O'Toole writes, "[Fruit Still Life with Wine Glass and Compote] is, in my opinion, an authentic work by Severin Roesen. The painting is stylistically and compositionally related to works produced by the artist during his time in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, where he lived from the early 1860s until 1872. In fact, this is a composition favored by the artist, and perhaps his clients as well, as he replicated over a dozen similar variations of it. It is similar to the painting illustrated as plate #35 in my book on the artist (J.H. O'Toole, Severin Roesen, London, 1992, pp. 64-5, plate 35). In oval format, two grey marble tiers hold a plethora of fruit such that the marble supports themselves can almost not be seen. Bunches of white grapes overhang from one tier to the other, beautifully rendered in their dense translucency with water droplets to accentuate their freshness and tendrils curling in elaborate arabesques as was the artist's style.

"Born in Cologne and trained in the German academic tradition of still-life painting, Severin Roesen immigrated to the United States in 1848, settled in New York City, and began to exhibit and sell his paintings. He left the city in the early 1860s and established himself amongst a community of fellow Germans in the central Pennsylvanian city of Williamsport, a booming lumber town in the late nineteenth century with many new wealthy immigrants who formed a strong clientele for the artist. His work was greatly appreciated, not only for its European style, reminiscent of home, but for the exuberance and optimism it displayed in the cornucopia of fruits and flowers symbolic of the wealth of natural resources presented by the New World and the hopes for a comfortable future of its new residents.

"In the artist's characteristic style, the objects are presented in a shallow picture plane arranged on two marble slabs or shelves. The fresh, brightly colored fruits including pears, peaches, currants, and plums cascade from upper to lower shelf. A beautiful Parian compote dish holding strawberries tops the composition crowned by grape leaves. The second object is a fluted glass filled with a sparkling beverage. Like the drops of dew on the fruit, the bubbles in the beverage allude to its freshness, as if someone had just placed it in the picture plane but would soon raise it and consume the contents. This is also a reference to memento mori, a common theme in still-life painting which refers to the fleetingness of life.

"The precise rendering of detail and texture throughout the canvas along with the smoothly blended forms and colors are hallmarks of Roesen's technique.

"For all the reasons discussed above, this is an authentic work by Severin Roesen."


More information about Severin Roesen. See also: Roesen, Severin, Rösen, Severin Artist.

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