Dining Room, Rue de Naples, Paris

Date1935

Maker Edouard Vuillard French, 1868 - 1940

Label TextVuillard painted domestic interiors throughout his career. As a student he was familiar with contemporary Impressionist examples, and he took a special interest in works by 17th-century Dutch and 18th-century French painters. In 1889 he banded with Paul Sérusier, Maurice Denis, and others in an avant-garde group called “Les Nabis” (The Prophets). Their goal was to make flat shapes the basis of a composition, calling attention to the interactions between expressive contours and arresting colors. Vuillard was sixty-six—and a respected establishment figure—when he painted this canvas. Dining Room, portraying the home of longtime family friends, exemplifies the style he had perfected in the 1910s: sensuous and gentle responses to color, light, and form, and a quiet testimonial to the private comforts of a prosperous life.

Object number91.15

ProvenanceThe artist; collection of Jacques Lindon (?-2003), New York, until May 27, 1954; consigned to [M. Knoedler & Co., New York, stock no. CA4601, May 27, 1954 - Nov. 11, 1954]; sold to Virginia Merrill (Mrs. Prentice Bloedel, 1902-1989), Bainbridge Island, Nov. 11, 1954 - Feb. 4, 1991; to Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, Washington, 1991

Photo CreditPhoto: Mark Woods

Exhibition HistorySeattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Five Installations on the Fourth Floor: Aspects of Late-Nineteenth-Century Art, 1997. Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, French Painting from SAM's Permanent Collection, Apr. 23, 2005 - Jan. 2, 2006.Published ReferencesMarx, Claude Roger. Edouard Vuillard, 1867-1940. Gazette des Beaux-Arts, June 1946; reproduced p. 375, fig. 15, as Madame Hessel and her Daughter lunching, about 1935. Marx, Claude Roger. Vuillard: His Life and Work. Paris: Arts et Metiers Graphiques, 1948; p. 69, reproduced pl. 61. Salomon, Antoine and Guy Cogeval. Vuillard: Catalogue critique des peintures et pastels, Vol. III. Paris: Skira and Wildenstein Institute, 2003; cat. no. XII-136, reproduced p. 1527.

Credit LineGift of Mr. and Mrs. Prentice Bloedel

Dimensions36 1/2 x 31 1/2 in. (92.7 x 80cm)

MediumOil on cardboard