APPLE BLOSSOMS IN A VASE, c.1934

Important Australian + International Fine Art
Melbourne
20 April 2011
39

ARTHUR STREETON

(1867 - 1943)
APPLE BLOSSOMS IN A VASE, c.1934

oil on canvas

60.0 x 45.0 cm

signed lower left: A. STREETON

Estimate: 
$35,000 - 45,000
Sold for $55,200 (inc. BP) in Auction 19 - 20 April 2011, Melbourne
Provenance

Christies, Sydney, 17 August 1998, lot 1189
Private collection, Sydney

Catalogue text

Australia's leading Impressionist artists, Tom Roberts, Frederick McCubbin and Arthur Streeton all painted flowers pieces. Although well known for their subjects of shearers, pioneers, and golden summers, their flowers paintings provide valuable insights into their art. As varied in approach as the varieties they painted, Roberts has a glorious Christmas Flowers and Christmas Belles c.1899 in the collection of the Manly Art Gallery as well as later paintings of poppies, roses and pelargoniums in private and public collections. McCubbin's delightful Still Life 1882 in the collection of the National Gallery of Victoria shows honesty, chrysanthemums and pansies painted in the Whisterlerian manner. Streeton's large body of flower paintings are jealously held in many collections, greatly admired for their realism. Apple Blossoms in a Vase c.1934 is a classic example. The pink-whiteness of the blooms and the sparkle of light on the cut glass vase are heightened by the velvety dark background in a manner most characteristic of Streeton. The translucent tall vase provides a perfect contrast to the fullness of the flowers, petals fallen on the shining tabletop adding an informality which increases the mood of intimacy. As a painter-gardener, Streeton knew his flowers well and celebrated their beauty and botanical variety with a painterly ease that is captivating. The facility with which he painted the natural appearance of Apple Blossoms in a Vase appears so effortless that the skill involved in its execution can be easily overlooked. In composition, for instance, the flared base of the vase bursts into the letter 'V' for victory - of the glorious, colourful flowers. For Streeton, flowers were a poetic metaphor of the triumph of beauty. Apple blossom, like all blossoms, is a harbinger of spring and the renewal of life. Reviewing a 1931 Streeton exhibition, The Argus art critic Harold Herbert wrote, 'His love of flowers inveigles him into a manner with paint which makes them tangible, beautiful things.'1

1. Herbert, H., 'Art Of Arthur Streeton: Sunlit Landscapes. Beautiful Flower Pieces', Argus, Melbourne, 17 March 1931, p. 8

DAVID THOMAS