Photo By Gail

American artist Patrick Henry Bruce (1881-1936) painted Objects on a Table (1920-21) in France, where he lived from 1904 to 1936. This still life depicts cut fruit, a glass with a straw, block-like shapes, and an architectural column with clean lines, geometric clarity, and cool tonalities. The painting exudes a rational stillness, especially when compared to Cubist still lifes by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque. In fact, Objects on a Table marks a deliberate and profound departure from Cubism, which gained negative associations during World War I because its fragmentation of form appeared to visualize the conflict’s deadly destruction.

Photographed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC.