Le sucrier et les bougies (Sugar Bowl and Candles)

Artist Diego Rivera (Mexican, 1886 - 1957)

Date1915

MediumOil on canvas

Dimensions25 1/8 x 21 1/8 in. (63.8 x 53.7 cm)
Framed: 30 1/8 x 25 7/8 x 1 3/4 in. (76.5 x 65.7 x 4.4 cm)

ClassificationsPainting

Credit LineAlfred Stieglitz Collection, Co-owned by Fisk University, Nashville, Tennessee, and Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas

Signedl.r.: D.M.R.

Accession number ASC.2012.79

On View

Not on view

Collections

Alfred Stieglitz Collection

Provenance(Unknown auction, New York City, NY); to Alfred Stieglitz, New York, NY; by bequest to Georgia O’Keeffe (his wife), New York, NY, 1946; to Fisk University, Nashville, TN, 1949; to Fisk University, Nashville, TN, and Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, AR, as co-owners, 2012
Label TextBetter known for his monumental murals depicting Indigenous heritage, working-class laborers, and Mexican national history, Diego Rivera’s earlier works—like this still-life painting— represent his practice when he lived in Paris from 1911 through 1920. The multidimensional renderings of a sugar bowl and a tobacco pipe call to mind the colonial invasions of the Americas and their exports to western Europe dependent on enslaved labor.

Mejor conocido por sus monumentales murales donde plasma la herencia indígena, los obreros de clase trabajadora y la historia nacional de México, las primeras obras de Diego Rivera —como esta naturaleza muerta— representan su práctica durante su estadía en París desde 1911 hasta entrada la década de 1920. Las representaciones multidimensionales de una azucarera y una pipa de tabaco evocan las invasiones coloniales de las Américas y las exportaciones a Europa Occidental que dependían del trabajo de las personas esclavizadas.