The artwork in question, “Still Life with Guitar,” was created by the artist Juan Gris in the year 1920. It is an oil painting on canvas, measuring 50.3 by 61 centimeters. This work is part of the Synthetic Cubism movement and is classified as a still life. The piece is housed at the Saint Louis Art Museum located in St. Louis, Missouri, United States.
In “Still Life with Guitar,” Gris presents a composition that is geometrically fragmented yet visually coherent, employing the characteristic forms of Synthetic Cubism. The painting showcases a guitar at its center, surrounded by other objects that are commonly associated with still life genre such as a glass, a newspaper, and a bowl of fruit. The depiction of these items is somewhat abstracted, with the use of planes, angles, and palette that favors muted blues, greens, browns, and yellows, achieving a sense of depth and dimensionality while simultaneously flattening the space. The contrasting textures and patterns within the composition contribute to a dynamic interplay between the objects and the surrounding space, typical of the innovative and analytical spirit of Cubism.
