At the end of his life, illness forced Manet to limit his work to the small-scale still lifes like this canvas and views of the garden around his house at Rueil, near Paris, where he lived during the summer of 1882.
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Title:Strawberries
Artist:Edouard Manet (French, Paris 1832–1883 Paris)
Date:ca. 1882
Medium:Oil on canvas
Dimensions:8 3/8 x 10 1/2 in. (21.3 x 26.7 cm)
Classification:Paintings
Credit Line:Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Nate B. Spingold, 1956
Object Number:56.230.1
Inscription: Signed (lower right): Manet
Auguste Pellerin, Paris (in 1902); Gaston Bernheim de Villers, Paris (by 1919–51; sold in July to Salz); [Sam Salz, New York, 1951; sold in August to Spingold]; Mr. and Mrs. Nate B. Spingold, New York (1951–56; his life interest, 1956–d. 1958; her life interest, 1956–d. 1976)
Berlin. Galerie Matthiesen. "Édouard Manet, 1832–1883," February 6–March 18, 1928, no. 80 (lent by a private collector, Paris).
New York. Greenwich House Music School Committee. 1953, no. ? (lent by Mr. Spingold) [see Rouart and Wildenstein 1975].
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "The Nate and Frances Spingold Collection," March 23–June 19, 1960, unnumbered cat.
Waltham, Mass. Dreitzer Gallery, Spingold Theater, Brandeis University. "Nate B. and Frances Spingold Collection," June 11–16, 1965, no catalogue.
Gifu, Japan. Musée des Beaux-Arts, Gifu. "Paris autour de 1882: Le développement de la peinture moderne en France et Hôsui Yamamoto," November 3–December 19, 1982, no. 77.
Kamakura. Kanagawa Museum of Modern Art. "Paris autour de 1882: Le développement de la peinture moderne en France et Hôsui Yamamoto," January 20–February 20, 1983, no. 77.
Dortmund. Museum für Kunst und Kulturgeschichte. "Cézanne, Manet, Schuch: Drei Wege zur autonomen Kunst," May 30–July 30, 2000, no. 16.
Paris. Musée d'Orsay. "Manet, les natures mortes," October 9, 2000–January 7, 2001, no. 44.
Baltimore. Walters Art Gallery. "Manet: The Still-Life Paintings," January 30–April 22, 2001, unnumbered cat.
Albertinum, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden. "Constable, Delacroix, Friedrich, Goya: Die Erschütterung der Sinne / A Shock to the Senses," March 16–August 4, 2013, unnumbered cat.
Art Institute of Chicago. "Manet and Modern Beauty: The Artist's Last Years," May 26–September 8, 2019, no. 79.
Los Angeles. J. Paul Getty Museum. "Manet and Modern Beauty: The Artist's Last Years," October 8, 2019–January 12, 2020, no. 79.
Théodore Duret. Histoire d'Édouard Manet et de son œuvre. Paris, 1902, pp. 273–74, no. 311, calls it "Une corbeille de fraises" and lists it as one of the pictures made at Rueil in 1882.
Etienne Moreau-Nélaton. Manuscrit de l'œuvre d'Édouard Manet, peinture et pastels. [1906], unpaginated, no. 306 [Département des Estampes, Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Paris].
Théodore Duret. Manet and the French Impressionists. 2nd ed. [1st ed. 1910]. London, 1912, p. 246, no. 311.
L'art moderne et quelques aspects de l'art d'autrefois; cent-soixante-treize planches d'après la collection privée de MM. J. & G. Bernheim-Jeune. Paris, 1919, vol. 1, p. 92, pl. 78.
A. Tabarant. Manet, histoire catalographique. Paris, 1931, pp. 424–25, no. 386.
Paul Jamot and Georges Wildenstein. Manet. Paris, 1932, vol. 1, p. 178, no. 485; vol. 2, fig. 446.
Paul Colin. Édouard Manet. Paris, 1932, p. 181, pl. XCVI.
A. Tabarant. Manet et ses œuvres. 4th ed. (1st. ed. 1942). Paris, 1947, pp. 453–54, 544, no. 412.
Charles Sterling and Margaretta M. Salinger. French Paintings: A Catalogue of the Collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Vol. 3, XIX–XX Centuries. New York, 1967, p. 52, ill.
Sandra Orienti inThe Complete Paintings of Manet. New York, 1967, p. 119, no. 395, ill.
Denis Rouart and Daniel Wildenstein. Édouard Manet, catalogue raisonné. Paris, 1975, vol. 1, pp. 300–301, no. 414, ill.
Kathleen Adler. Manet. Oxford, 1986, pp. 192–93, fig. 183, comments that the use of strawberries in still-lifes traditionally had a symbolic association with Christ's incarnation, but that this work is divested of such interpretation; notes that small works such as this one were intended as gifts.
Katharine Baetjer. European Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art by Artists Born Before 1865: A Summary Catalogue. New York, 1995, p. 447, ill.
Juliet Wilson-Bareau. E-mail to Gary Tinterow. March 21, 2000, suggests that this painting might correspond to "Fraise" listed in Manet's account book as sold to Pertuiset in 1881 for Fr 100; proposes that because of the finish of this work it could have been painted earlier, at least 1880.
Heike Biedermann. Constable, Delacroix, Friedrich, Goya: Die Erschütterung der Sinne / A Shock to the Senses. Exh. cat., Albertinum, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden. Dresden, 2013, pp. 154, 205–6, ill. (color).
Manet and Modern Beauty: The Artist's Last Years. Ed. Scott Allan, Emily A. Beeny, and Gloria Groom. Exh. cat., Art Institute of Chicago. Los Angeles, 2019, no. 79, ill. p. 261 (color).
Scott Allan inManet and Modern Beauty: The Artist's Last Years. Ed. Scott Allan, Emily A. Beeny, and Gloria Groom. Exh. cat., Art Institute of Chicago. Los Angeles, 2019, p. 39 n. 42, pp. 305 (under no. 58), 316–17, 320 (under no. 86), no. 79, ill., dates it about 1881–82, suggesting that it was either among the first still lifes Manet produced in Rueil in 1882 (given strawberry season and that he rented there from July on), or produced previous to that year and sold to Pertuiset in 1881 (following Wilson-Bareau 2000).
Emily A. Beeny inManet and Modern Beauty: The Artist's Last Years. Ed. Scott Allan, Emily A. Beeny, and Gloria Groom. Exh. cat., Art Institute of Chicago. Los Angeles, 2019, p. 105, includes it among the artist's still lifes that betray Chardin's influence.
Carol Armstrong inManet and Modern Beauty: The Artist's Last Years. Ed. Scott Allan, Emily A. Beeny, and Gloria Groom. Exh. cat., Art Institute of Chicago. Los Angeles, 2019, p. 118, calls it "Chardinesque".
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