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Interior with Paintings and a Pheasant by Édouard Vuillard

Édouard Vuillard · 1928-01-01

In 1928, Édouard Vuillard painted a dead pheasant in the home of the David-Weill family. The French banker and collector David David-Weill was one of the most significant art patrons of the early 20th century. The painting is not about the bird. It is about what hangs on the wall behind it.

Look to the upper right corner. Those faint rectangles are framed paintings from David-Weill's legendary collection. Vuillard makes them nearly illegible, dissolved into the dim light. The two figures in the room, Antoinette David-Weill and her nephew Maurice, are treated the same way, more atmosphere than likeness. The painter's loyalty is to the quiet, cultured space they inhabit.

Vuillard had left the avant-garde Nabis group by this time. He was the painter of choice for wealthy French families who wanted their interiors recorded, not their faces. He delivered the truth of a room: the density of the air, the grain of a wooden board, the chromatic shock of a dead bird's feathers against muted walls.

Why do you think Vuillard made the paintings on the wall so hard to read? Was it discretion, or an instruction to look harder?

Details

Its feathers contain every color this painting can offer.
Its feathers contain every color this painting can offer.
Those barely legible rectangles matter. This is a collector's home.
Those barely legible rectangles matter. This is a collector's home.
The owners are here too, dissolved into the wallpaper beside their art.
The owners are here too, dissolved into the wallpaper beside their art.
The compositional anchor , a hunting trophy displayed with almost still-life formality; its warm russet-and-chestnut plumage is the most chromatic element in a muted interior.
The compositional anchor , a hunting trophy displayed with almost still-life formality; its warm russet-and-chestnut plumage is the most chromatic element in a muted interior.
The timber grain is loosely indicated; this humble support contrasts with the richly furnished interior suggested by the title.
The timber grain is loosely indicated; this humble support contrasts with the richly furnished interior suggested by the title.
Transcript

A hunted pheasant, laid out in a shadowed room. Its feathers contain every color this painting can offer. Now look past the bird, to the wall on the upper right. Those barely legible rectangles matter. This is a collector's home. The owners are here too, dissolved into the wallpaper beside their art. Vuillard paints them as atmosphere, not as portraits. The true identity is in the collection.