Provenance

Alex Reid & Lefèvre, Ltd

Alex Reid & Lefèvre
Alex Reid & Lefèvre
Lefevre Gallery

British, est. 1926

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See all 40 works of art
A profusion of white roses bursting from the neck of a tan jug almost fills the height of this horizontal still life painting. The roses have large, round blooms with petals tinged with denim and aquamarine blue, sage green, mauve pink, teal, and butter yellow. Emerald-green leaves fill the spaces between blossoms. The jug has a short, rounded handle and sits on a sea glass-green surface. A few blooms lie in the lower left corner and at the foot of the vessel. Many of the flowers, leaves, and vase are outlined with navy blue or black. A mint-green wall with wavy, diagonal streaks of cream white fills the background. The paint is applied thickly with visible strokes.
Vincent van Gogh, Roses, 1890, oil on canvas, Gift of Pamela Harriman in memory of W. Averell Harriman, 1991.67.1

Roses

Vincent van Gogh · 1890 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1991.67.1

We look across river at a bridge with a city skyline beyond in this stylized, horizontal landscape, which is painted entirely with broad, visible brushstrokes in vivid, saturated colors. The river spans nearly the width of the canvas, and the riverbank is lined to our left with a row of several buildings between us and the bridge. Those buildings are outlined with royal blue and filled in with mostly flat areas of color in coral pink, mint green, tangerine orange, and pinkish tan. Letters across the top of the building farthest from us reads “BREVER.” Eight boats are tied up at the foot of the buildings. The pointed hulls of three extend into the scene from the lower left corner, painted in marigold orange and outlined in cobalt blue. Five more boats, with rounded prows and hulls and painted with lapis blue and muted aqua, line up like a row of empty shoes. The bridge runs from behind the tallest building to our left across and off the canvas, and is painted with deep lapis blue with crimson-red Xes crisscrossing the span to suggest trestles. The front faces of the pilings below are also highlighted with red. The river fills most of the bottom half of the painting. The water to our left is painted as a field of coral pink with a few, short horizontal baby and cobalt-blue strokes, suggesting reflections of the boats and a bridge piling. A narrow band of kiwi green and sky blue lines the pink field to our right. Next to it, the water is painted as short, horizontal, disconnected strokes and dots mostly in bumblebee yellow with some strokes in bubblegum pink and pale burnt orange, all against the off white of the canvas below. The final zone, to our right, is more densely painted with short dashes in indigo, turquoise, and aqua blue. Beyond the bridge, the skyline is painted in silhouette with spiky spires to our left in mint green and a mass of shorter buildings in periwinkle blue to our right. Four clouds of pale yellow billow off the bridge in front of the skyline. The sky above is painted with short and long vertical strokes of butter yellow, rose pink, pale orange, and a few areas of watermelon pink. The artist signed the work with cobalt-blue paint near the lower left corner: “a derain.”
André Derain, Charing Cross Bridge, London, 1906, oil on canvas, John Hay Whitney Collection, 1982.76.3

Charing Cross Bridge, London

André Derain · 1906 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1982.76.3

A pale-skinned young girl with blond hair, wearing a blue dress, stands in a garden in this vertical painting. The girl and background are painted with blended strokes, giving the scene and especially the girl a soft look. She faces our right and stands in the middle of the composition. Her shoulder-length cloud of hair is topped with a red bow, and long bangs frame her round face. Under faint brows, her sapphire-blue eyes look to our right. She has a petite nose, and her coral-pink mouth turns up in a slight smile. Her cobalt-blue dress is trimmed with wide, blue-white lace on the neckline, across the bottom hem, and down the front to either side of a row of white buttons. The white edges her petticoats come down to just below her knees, peeking out from under the flaring skirt. She wears white socks over blue ankle boots, which also have a row of white buttons down the side we can see. Her near hand is raised with her index finger hooked in the handle of a green watering can, and she holds two daisies by her side in her other hand. She stands on a path flecked with ivory white, pale purples, greens, and pink that curves up and to her left. A bush with emerald and pine-green leaves dotted with pink blooms fills the lower left corner. Behind her, green grass runs back to meet a profusion of pink, purple, and poppy-red plants and flowers that run along the top edge of the composition. The artist signed and dated the lower right, “Renoir. 76.”
Auguste Renoir, A Girl with a Watering Can, 1876, oil on canvas, Chester Dale Collection, 1963.10.206

A Girl with a Watering Can

Auguste Renoir · 1876 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1963.10.206

Shown from the lap up, a man wearing an ash-brown suit and top hat sits turned mostly away from us, next to a round table, facing a group of at least three women farther back in the room in this vertical painting. The scene is loosely painted with visible, mostly vertical strokes, and most of the forms, clothing, and objects are outlined in cobalt blue. Sitting in a wooden, ladderback chair, the man’s body takes up the bottom right quadrant of the painting. His skin is painted pale turquoise. His face turns away from us so we see the tip of his nose and the lines of his cheek and double chin. He has short brown hair under his top hat. He holds a silver-topped cane in one hand, which rests in his lap. A glass with some clear liquid sits on the table in front of him, to our left. A peanut-brown column spans the height of the painting just beyond him, near the right edge of the composition. Three women stand closely together in the near distance, in the upper left corner of the painting. At the front of the trio, a woman with a peach-colored face wears an indigo-blue mask over her eyes. A few swipes of paint indicate blond hair, possibly pulled up. She faces our right in profile and stands with her right hand, closer to us, planted on her hip. She wears a bubblegum-pink sleeveless top and form-fitting pants. The skin of her arm and the skin on the face of the woman standing just beyond her is a cream-white tinged with blue. That second woman faces our right in profile, and her blond hair is either short or also pulled up. A teal-green strap of a low-cut dress crosses over the shoulder we can see. A third woman stands in front of this pair, between them and the seated man. She faces away from us and wears a cotton candy-pink robe and hood that completely covers her body. The wall at the back of the room is painted with areas of brick red, moss green, and a grayish mauve pink.
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Maxime Dethomas, 1896, oil on cardboard, Chester Dale Collection, 1963.10.219

Maxime Dethomas

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec · 1896 · oil on cardboard ·  Accession ID  1963.10.219

The sculpture depicts a horse in a dynamic pose, with one of its front legs raised. It is crafted from a dark material, likely bronze, giving it a rich, dark brown color with a slightly shiny surface. It is displayed on a rectangular base made from the same material. The surface of the horse is textured, showing details such as musculature, mane, and tail. The horse is proportionate and realistic in its depiction, evoking a sense of naturalism. The size of the sculpture is small, indicative that it is a model or a small-scale work rather than a life-sized representation.
Théodore Gericault, Flayed Horse III, model c. 1820/1824, cast 1959-1960, bronze, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, 1980.44.9

Flayed Horse III

Théodore Gericault · model c. 1820/1824, cast 1959-1960 · bronze ·  Accession ID  1980.44.9

A tree with emerald-green leaves and laden with white blossoms grows in a dirt field, and is silhouetted against a vibrant blue sky in this horizontal landscape painting. The scene is loosely painted with visible dabs and strokes. The tree takes up most of the left half of the painting, and is closest to us. It casts a dappled shadow onto the ground to our right. A barren tree with gnarled branches grows nearby, in the tree’s shadow. A row of more trees extends in the distance to our right. A narrow dirt path, bordered by low green growth, stretches from the bottom edge of the canvas, to our right of center, into the field. To our left and farther from us, a woman leans over and reaches for the ground. She faces our left in profile and wears a white bonnet, a brown shawl, and a blue skirt. Near the line of trees to our right, a man walks toward the woman. He wears blue pants, a white shirt, a dark cap, and he carries a tan bag over his left shoulder. There are more trees along the horizon, which comes about a third of the way up the composition. The sky above is light gray near the horizon and deepens to vivid blue with fluffy white clouds. The painting is signed and dated in the lower right: “C. Pissarro 1872.”
Camille Pissarro, Orchard in Bloom, Louveciennes, 1872, oil on canvas, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Collection, 1970.17.51

Orchard in Bloom, Louveciennes

Camille Pissarro · 1872 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1970.17.51

We look slightly down onto a balding, bearded man with pale, peachy skin and wearing a three-piece suit, seated in a wooden armchair behind an L-shaped desk, in this loosely painted vertical portrait. A tabby cat with a white chest sits on his lap. The room around them is packed with piles of papers, books, and paintings hung on scarlet-red walls. The man’s body faces us, and he looks off to our right under dark, bushy, peaked eyebrows. His round head is fringed with gray hair, and he has a full, light gray beard. His gray eyes are bloodshot beneath heavy lids, with dark rings underneath. He has a short nose, and the flesh of his cheeks hangs in loose paunches alongside his nose. Close inspection finds strokes of plum and lavender purple, mint and sage green, and ice blue creating highlights and shadows on this face. His left hand, to our right, hangs loosely over the arm of the chair, while his other hand gently rests around the chest of the small cat that sits on his lap. The man wears a chocolate-brown jacket over a charcoal-gray vest, and a dark bowtie with a white shirt that just shows at his throat and wrists. Reams of pink, yellow, white, green, and gold paper are arrayed on the desk in front of the man, and in tall, uneven piles to his left, with more on a chair against the wall behind him. A small paperweight globe of multicolored glass on a brass base rests on one sheet of paper on the desk. Two small and one large gilt-framed portraits hang on the velvety red wall in the background, and others are reflected in a gilt-framed mirror at the upper right corner of the painting. A white door with four horizontal panels is closed behind the man at the upper left corner. The brushwork in the painting is quick and loose, with touches of contrasting colors throughout. The artist signed and dated the lower left corner, “E. Vuillard 1912.”
Edouard Vuillard, Théodore Duret, 1912, oil on cardboard on wood, Chester Dale Collection, 1963.10.70

Théodore Duret

Edouard Vuillard · 1912 · oil on cardboard on wood ·  Accession ID  1963.10.70

Painted entirely with small dots of pure color mostly in slate and azure blue, olive green, and cream white, this scene shows a sandy beach stretching to a lighthouse at the center and a four-story building to our right in this horizontal seascape. The tall, slender lighthouse standing on the water’s edge a short distance from us is painted with specks of azure and sky blue, ivory, and peach. In the distance to our left, a pier stretches into the sea along the horizon, which comes about two-thirds of the way up this composition. A sailboat floats just off the pier, near the left edge of the painting. To our right of the lighthouse and extending off the right edge of the canvas, the building has three levels of windows and a row of dormers along the tall, peaked roof. The building is painted with touches of dove gray, sapphire blue, and pale pink. In front of the building and to our right, a denim-blue shed has a tangerine-orange roof. A wooden rowboat outlined in cornflower blue with flecks of dandelion yellow rests on the sand next to the shed. In front of us, dots of moss green blend into the blond tones of the sand, creating an impression of grass on the beach. Sunlight shimmers on the sea to our left, which is painted with short dashes of mint and seafoam green, baby blue, cream, and shell pink, beneath a clear, ice-blue sky.
Georges Seurat, The Lighthouse at Honfleur, 1886, oil on canvas, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, 1983.1.33

The Lighthouse at Honfleur

Georges Seurat · 1886 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1983.1.33

This painting shows a person seated at a table in a bright yellow chair, facing the right. The person has pale skin and gray hair, and they are wearing a loose-fitting light brown garment, similar to a long coat or dress. On the table in front of them appear to be various indistinct objects in shades of white and red. The background has a dark green area on the right which may be a wall or curtain, with a lighter area on the left that maybe be a window or door. The floor is painted in shades of brown and beige. The brushstrokes in the painting are thick and visible, making the scene appear blurred.
Edouard Vuillard, Breakfast, 1894, oil on cardboard, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Collection, 1970.17.97

Breakfast

Edouard Vuillard · 1894 · oil on cardboard ·  Accession ID  1970.17.97

Shown from the lap up, a cleanshaven man with black hair and dark clothes faces us as he sits with his hands resting together in his lap in this stylized, vertical portrait painting. The man's features, clothing, and the room are painted with areas of mottled color with visible brushstrokes, so many details are indistinct. The man has peach-colored skin, and his facial features are outlined. He has dark eyes that look at us or slightly up, under thin, arched brows. One eye is a little higher than the other, and the two halves of his long face do not quite match. He has a wide nose, and his full, dark rose-pink lips are closed. His hair is parted down the middle and is brushed down to meet his ears. He has an elongated neck, and his narrow shoulders slope down. He wears black pants and a black coat over a dark teal-green vest. A white shirt is visible along his neckline, and an area of black could be the knot of a tie. He holds the fingers of one hand in his other, both hands resting in his lap. A loosely painted, brown table sits next to the man to our right, and an area of slate blue and white could be a glass on the table. A vertical line in the background behind the man, to our right, probably indicates the corner of the room. The walls are painted with strokes of smoke gray, ocean blue, and some parchment white. The artist signed the work in dark letters in the upper right corner, “modigliani.”
Amedeo Modigliani, Chaim Soutine, 1918, oil on canvas, Chester Dale Collection, 1963.10.47

Chaim Soutine

Amedeo Modigliani · 1918 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1963.10.47

Bibliography

1967

  • Pickvance, Ronald. A Man of Influence: Alex Reid 1854-1928. Exh. cat. Edinburgh, 1967.

1968

  • Pickvance, Ronald. "A Man of Influence: Alex Reid 1854-1928," Scottish Art Review II (1968): 5-9.

1976

  • Cooper, Douglas, introduction. Alex Reid & Lefevre 1926-1976. London, 1976

2002

  • Fowles, Frances in Millet to Matisse: Nineteenth and Twentieth-Century French Painting from the Kelvingrove Art Gallery, Glasgow. Exh. cat, 2002: 205-6