SUSAN STEIN: Cézanne once proclaimed, "With an apple, I want to astonish Paris." And he succeeded, even in the most deceptively simple still lifes. At the other end of the spectrum are still lifes such as this sumptuous arrangement with its richly orchestrated play of overlapping shapes, patterns, color, and textures. In contrast to the plain wooden table that stands guard in the background at left, the artist presents a bountiful low-lying arrangement that seems to spill forth like a turbulent sea in unanchored splendor, defying logic and even gravity.

KEITH CHRISTIANSEN: Yet Cézanne holds it all in check with his canny placement of objects and geometric juxtapositions. Many of the still life elements here appear repeatedly in Cézanne’s work: the ginger pot, for example, is featured in more than a dozen compositions dating to the early 1890s.

SUSAN STEIN: At the right, three eggplants dangling from a forked branch keynote the unfolding dialogue below between the rhythmic curves of the fruit and the drape of the table linen on the one hand, and the crisscrossing willow strands around the ginger jar and the bottle of rum on the other. Well-suited to his disposition, his slow, methodical approach to painting, and his probing gaze, still life was the mainstay of Cézanne's long career. "Even at a dinner party, Cézanne would stop at each moment," wrote one artist friend, "to study our faces under the effects of the lamp and the shadows. Every plate, every meal, every piece of fruit, every glass, every object close to him was the subject of his comments and thought."