Abstract, Cubist painting of objects on a table, highly geometric and boldy rendered in angular shapes of yellow, green blue, and brown. Errant details and textures emerge, often indecipherable as specific objects, but a small book of matches at center is clearly rendered, down to the writing on its cover.

Still Life with a Box of Matches (Nature morte à la boite d'allumettes)

1918

María Blanchard Spanish, 1881-1932

Spain

This densely layered tabletop brims with the classic elements of a Paris cafe: glassware, a soda siphon, a bottle of Benedictine liqueur, and the box of matches identified in the title. Reflecting María Blanchard’s Cubist wit with bold color and heavy impasto, the painting incorporates small fragments of glass beads as one of the many textures on the work’s surface, along with coarse and fine sand. During her lifetime, Blanchard was celebrated by her fellow Cubists, and she shared studios with Juan Gris and Diego Rivera, the latter of whom described her as producing Cubism’s “finest works, apart from our master, Picasso.”

This is one of thirty-five works that comprise the Winterbotham Collection. Click here to learn more about the collection.

Oil, sand, and glass on canvas

Modern Art