Artwork
Banquet in Silence
Banquet in Silence is an oil painting by the American Folk Art artist Marsden Hartley. It dates from 1935 and is held in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
About this work
Subject & Meaning
Marsden Hartley's Banquet in Silence represents a still life arrangement featuring a banquet plate holding a fish and unidentified fruit on a platter.
Marsden Hartley's Banquet in Silence represents a still life arrangement featuring a banquet plate holding a fish and unidentified fruit on a platter. The composition centers on these food items, emphasizing the banquet setting through the prominent display of the plated fish and accompanying fruit. The artwork's title introduces a contemplative or solemn quality to the otherwise traditional still life subject, suggesting a quiet, perhaps meditative, interpretation of the meal or feast depicted.
Technique & Style
Banquet in Silence is executed in oil paint on canvas board, a support choice consistent with Hartley's working methods of the mid-1930s. The composition is modest in scale, measuring 40.3 cm in height and 50.8 cm in width, giving the still life an intimate, closely observed format. Hartley renders a banquet plate bearing fish alongside unidentified fruit, treating the subject with the simplified, near-silent arrangement implied by the title.
The use of oil allows for the layered, tactile handling typical of his still-life paintings of this period, while the canvas-board support suits the relatively small, focused image. No specific condition reports are documented in the available sources.
History & Provenance
Banquet in Silence is an oil painting on canvas board executed by Marsden Hartley in 1935. No documentation of a formal commission survives, and the work remained in Hartley’s possession until it was given by the artist to Georgia O’Keeffe. It later entered the Metropolitan Museum of Art through O’Keeffe, establishing the museum as the current owner.
Its dimensions measure 40.3 × 50.8 cm, and the composition depicts a banquet plate with fish and unidentified fruit. The sources do not specify an accession number or a documented exhibition history for the work.
Overview
Marsden Hartley's 1935 oil painting, Banquet in Silence, presents a stark still life centered on a platter of fish. This work, part of The Metropolitan Museum of Art's collection, exemplifies the artist's distinctive approach to form and color. It captures a moment of quiet intensity, inviting contemplation of its unusual arrangement and tactile surface, reflecting Hartley's engagement with themes of nature and mortality in his later career.
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Artist & collection
Artist
Marsden Hartley was an American Modernist painter, poet, and essayist. Hartley developed his painting abilities by observing Cubist artists in Paris and Berlin.
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Eboșă cu un vas de sticlă cu flori roșii așezat pe un suport în jumătatea din stânga a lucrării. În jumătatea din dreapta, mult în spate față de vasul cu flori, un alt vas de sticlă, mic, cu trei pensule. Fundal ocru, colorat cu pastă violet și albastră în marginea din dreapta a lucrării. Flori vag schițate cu roșu și alb, iar suportul este acoperit cu un material în dungi colorate în portocaliu, alternând cu gri și violet. Semnat și datat cu violet și brun, stânga jos: Craiu (19)76.
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