Still Life on a Table

Roberts Gallery, Toronto Collection of Gerald Moses, Toronto Estate of Barbara Mercer, Toronto

More so than his Group of Seven contemporaries, Goodridge Roberts placed a special emphasis on the still-life, returning to the motif repeatedly over a thirty-year period. In the early 1960s, Roberts explored several variations on the subject of an unassuming studio table still life, rendering the painted surface in thick, confident impasto. The lively, rigorous brushwork demonstrated here contrasts with the subdued, earthy tones of the painting. Roberts added energy and focus to the composition with the bright yellow and orange hues of the fruit and flowers. The influence of early Cubism is acknowledged through the flattened perspective of the table-top in space. Roberts consistently painted directly from life, but continued to find new, inventive aesthetic territory to explore within the traditional genre.