Oil paint on canvas
Tate Modern
Tate Collection
Works with images
Works on display
General Collection
C Frank Stoop
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/georges-braque-803" aria-label="More by Georges Braque" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Georges Braque</a>
Guitar and Jug
Presented by C. Frank Stoop 1928
abstract concepts
branch
fine arts and music
food and drink
fruit, apple
glass
harmony - music
instrument, guitar
kitchen
nature
nature - fruit
objects
symbols and personifications
<p>Braque used traditional artists’ props such as guitars, jugs and glasses to experiment with composition. The familiar objects in Guitar and Jug are presented in sombre colours of brown and grey. He uses fluid lines to create the objects, their softness set against a rigorous structure. The items may also have symbolic meaning. The guitar may suggest artistic harmony. The apples, branch and glass could celebrate the abundance of nature. Braque’s interest in depicting a variety of materials and textures is also clear. In this work he includes wood, glass, fabric, organic elements and wallpaper.</p><p><em>Gallery label, August 2020</em></p>
painting oil paint canvas
3 March 2003 – 2 November 2005
2005-11-02
3 March 2003 – 2 November 2005
2005-11-02
2003-03-03
Tate Modern (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/
2003-03-03
Still Life Introductory
Collection based display
17 May 2014 – 25 January 2015
2015-01-25
17 May 2014 – 28 September 2014
2014-09-28
2014-05-17
Tate St Ives (St Ives, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/stives/
24 October 2014 – 25 January 2015
2015-01-25
2014-10-24
Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art (Middlesbrough, UK)
http://www.visitmima.com/
2014-05-17
International Exchanges: St Ives and Modern Art, 1915 - 1965
Exhibition
17 May 2014 – 31 January 2015
2015-01-31
1 October 2014 – 31 January 2015
2015-01-31
2014-10-01
Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art (Middlesbrough, UK)
http://www.visitmima.com/
2014-05-17
International Exchanges: St Ives and Modern Art, 1915 - 1965
Loan-out
26 April 2016
26 April 2016
2016-04-26
Tate Modern (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/
2016-04-26
Studio Practice
Collection based display
Guitar and Jug
support: 810 × 1165 mm
frame: 1135 × 1488 × 106 mm
Presented by <a href="/search?gid=999999963" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">C. Frank Stoop</a> 1928
<div class="text">
<p>
<i>Guitar and Jug </i>is a rectangular, horizontally orientated oil painting on canvas by the French artist Georges Braque that depicts a collection of objects: a guitar, pitcher, glass, branch and two pieces of fruit. These are arranged on a flat surface, possibly a <i>guéridon</i> (pedestal table) or a tray. The palette is dark and sombre and dominated by browns and greys. The guitar is shown on its back and at an angle, slightly twisting towards the viewer. It forms a strong diagonal, leading the eye to the earthenware pitcher on the right, which is outlined in white paint and has a spout that faces forwards. Below the pitcher are two fruits resembling apples, arranged on a piece of fabric. The fabric flows over the edge of the table and out of the bottom of the picture. A vivid green branch with leaves placed next to the pitcher curves elegantly, following the shape of the table. Behind the guitar to the left is depicted a goblet seen slightly from above. The scene’s background appears to feature a white wall, adding depth to the image, as well as what may be a section of peeling wallpaper to the left. The signature ‘G. Braque’ appears in white paint in the lower right corner of the image.</p>
<p>It is likely that Braque painted <i>Guitar and Jug </i>in his house on rue du Douanier in Paris, to which he had moved in 1924. It was completed towards the end of 1927 or very early in 1928. Sources contemporary with Braque (including his dealer Paul Rosenberg) have indicated that the painting was not photographed until 1928, which may suggest that it was created in winter 1927–8 (see Ronald Alley, <i>Catalogue of the Tate Gallery’s Collection of Modern Art other than Works by British Artists</i>, London 1981, p.80). Braque has applied the oil paint in long, luscious brushstrokes that are particularly visible in the rendering of the fabric. These expressive elements are offset by shorter brushstrokes used in the white area in the background, which has a choppy, scumbled appearance. The painting’s surface is therefore varied in texture. Rosenberg’s records indicate a different title for this image: <i>Mandolin, Glass, Pot and Fruit</i>. However, in 1950, when Braque was shown a photograph of the painting, he named it <i>Guitar and Jug </i>(Alley 1981, p.80)<i>.</i>
</p>
<p>By the time <i>Guitar and Jug </i>was painted Braque had moved beyond the analytical cubist style that he had developed in collaboration with Picasso in c.1908–12. By the late 1920s he was concentrating on aspects other than form and space, and according to the art historian Douglas Cooper ‘his work at this time was characterised by its serenity, smoothness, suavity and resonance; his forms are more freely invented, and have an appealing pliability, but they are still cubist in conception although they correspond more nearly than before to natural appearances’ (Cooper 1994, p.221). The curved lines of the guitar, apples and flowing fabric in <i>Guitar and Jug </i>are examples of the ‘appealing pliability’ and ‘smoothness’ identified by Cooper. The jug’s rounded form has been particularly emphasised by the addition of a white outline, as if light is shining on its glaze. Braque’s concern with depicting a variety of materials and textures in <i>Guitar and Jug </i>is also clear: wood, glass, fabric, organic elements and wallpaper are all featured. This emphasis on texture and shape appeals to what Cooper refers to as the viewer’s ‘tactile experience of reality and space’ (Cooper 1994, p.221) and represents a departure from the faceted, fractured planes of his earlier analytical cubist paintings, which were aimed at bringing a new awareness to the viewer’s visual experience of the world. (See, for instance, <i>Clarinet and Bottle of Rum on a Mantelpiece </i>1911, Tate <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/braque-clarinet-and-bottle-of-rum-on-a-mantelpiece-t02318" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>T02318</span></a>.)</p>
<p>Braque was a keen collector of musical instruments; he played the violin and accordion and had studied the flute. Instruments often appear in his cubist paintings: ‘first of all because I was surrounded by them and also because their forms, their volume, came into the ken of the still life as I understood it’ (quoted in Cooper 2002, p.44). The guitar is a particularly recurrent motif in Braque’s works from this period, and his oeuvre more generally; for example, a guitar features in <i>Mandora </i>1909–10 (Tate <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/braque-mandora-t00833" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>T00833</span></a>) and <i>Fruit, Glass, and Mandolin</i> 1938 (National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC). The symbolism of the guitar in Braque’s work is not clear, although it may represent artistic harmony.</p>
<p>
<i>Guitar and Jug </i>is linked to a series of works Braque began in earnest from 1918 and continued throughout the 1920s, in which he focused on painting collections of objects, often musical instruments, on a <i>guéridon</i>. <i>The Round Table</i> 1929 (Phillips Collection, Washington, DC) is another work in this still life format. More generally, <i>Guitar and Jug </i>is an example of Braque’s later synthetic cubist style, which fully developed following his recovery from a head wound sustained in military service in 1915. According to Cooper, Braque’s move towards depicting the decorative textures of materials in <i>Guitar and Jug</i> can be viewed as his ‘personal contribution to the expressive range of late cubism, and he continued to elaborate it in a succession of luscious, sonorous still lifes during the next ten years’ (Cooper 1994, p.221).</p>
<p>
<b>Further reading</b>
<br/>Ronald Alley, <i>Catalogue of the Tate Gallery’s Collection of Modern Art other than Works by British Artists</i>, London 1981, pp.79–80, reproduced p.79.<br/>Douglas Cooper, <i>The Cubist Epoch</i>, London 1994.<br/>Philip Cooper, <i>Cubism</i>, London 2002.</p>
<p>Jo Kear<br/>May 2016</p>
<p>
<i>Supported by Christie’s.</i>
</p>
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Summary
2016-06-20T00:00:00
summary
SHORT_TEXT
<div class="text">
<p>Braque used traditional artists’ props such as guitars, jugs and glasses to experiment with composition. The familiar objects in Guitar and Jug are presented in sombre colours of brown and grey. He uses fluid lines to create the objects, their softness set against a rigorous structure. The items may also have symbolic meaning. The guitar may suggest artistic harmony.  The apples, branch and glass could celebrate the abundance of nature. Braque’s interest in depicting a variety of materials and textures is also clear. In this work he includes wood, glass, fabric, organic elements and wallpaper.</p>
</div>

Display caption
2020-08-21T00:00:00
display-caption
DISPLAY_CAPTION
<p><b>Georges Braque</b> 1882-1963</p>
<p><a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/braque-guitar-and-jug-n04416" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>N04416</span></a> <b>Guitare et Pichet</b> (Guitar and Jug) 1927</p>
<p>Inscribed 'G Braque | 27' b.r. 
<br/>Oil on canvas, 31 7/8 x 45 7/8 (81 x 116.5) 
<br/>Presented by C. Frank Stoop 1928 
<br/><i>Prov</i>: With Paul Rosenberg, Paris (purchased from the artist); C. Frank Stoop, London 
<br/><i>Exh: Braque and Rouault</i>, Tate Gallery, April-May 1946 (67); <i>G. Braque</i>, RSA, Edinburgh, August-September 1956 (60, repr.); Tate Gallery, September-November 1956 (60, repr.); <i>Georges Braque og Henri Laurens</i>, Louisiana Museum, Humlebaek, March-May 1969 (229) 
<br/><i>Lit</i>: J.B. Manson, 'Mr Frank Stoop's Modern Pictures' in <i>Apollo, X</i>, 1929, pp.127-9, repr. p.127; George Isarlov, 'Georges Braque' in <i>Orbes</i>, No.3, Spring 1932, p.93, No.479 as 'Mandoline, verre, pot et fruits' and dated 1928; Nicole S. Mangin, <i>Catalogue de l'Oeuvre de Georges Braque: Peintures 1924-1927</i> (Paris 1968), p.99, repr. as 'Nature Morte (à la guitare)'; Marco Valsecchi and Massimo Carrà, <i>L'Opera Completa di Braque 1908-1929</i> (Milan 1971), No.338, p.102, repr. p.101 and pl.LIII in colour</p>
<p>Probably completed at the very end of 1927 or early in 1928, as it was dated 1928 by Isarlov and its Paul Rosenberg photo number 2119 shows that it was not photographed until the latter year. Isarlov, who had access to Paul Rosenberg's records, gave its title as 'Mandolin, Glass, Pot and Fruit', but the instrument appears to be a deep-sided guitar of a characteristically South American form. Braque himself, on being shown a <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/photograph" title="Glossary definition for 'Photograph'"><span>photograph</span></a> in 1950, inscribed it 'Guitar and Jug'.</p>
<p><b>Published in</b>: 
<br/>Ronald Alley, <i>Catalogue of the Tate Gallery's Collection of Modern Art other than Works by British Artists</i>, Tate Gallery and Sotheby Parke-Bernet, London 1981, pp.79-80, reproduced p.79</p>

Catalogue entry
2004-09-15T00:00:00
catalogue-entry
CATALOGUE_ENTRY
abstract concepts branch fine arts and music food and drink fruit, apple glass harmony - music instrument, guitar kitchen nature nature - fruit objects symbols and personifications