The artwork “Still Life with Green Melon” was created by the artist Paul Cézanne around the year 1906. This work is executed in watercolor on paper and is notable for its association with the Cubist movement, despite Cézanne himself not being a Cubist. The dimensions of this piece are 12 by 19 inches, or 30.5 by 48.3 centimeters. As its genre suggests, it is a still life, which is a category of art that typically depicts inanimate objects. Currently, this work resides within a private collection.
The artwork presents a collection of objects arranged in a manner characteristic of Cézanne’s style, which often teeters on the edge of abstraction. The green melon, with its softly contoured form, dominates the central area of the composition. To the right, there appears to be a glass vessel of some sort, along with another fruit, perhaps an apple, rendered with a burst of red and yellow tones contrasting the predominate greens. The melon, the glass object, and the other elements are depicted with broad, loose brushstrokes that merge colors and shapes, mixing contours with the backdrop. The background and tabletop are delineated with less definition, allowing the various hues to bleed into one another, creating an impression of depth and space. This piece reflects Cézanne’s sustained interest in exploring the relationships between objects, the spatial dynamics within a composition, and the subtle interplay of light and color.
