Chestnut Trees, a Cartoon for a Tiffany Stained-Glass Window

Executed on cardboard in 1894, this cartoon for a proposed Tiffany stained-glass window represents an unusual intersection of fine art and decorative commission in Vuillard's early career. Louis Comfort Tiffany's firm was actively recruiting avant-garde European artists for window designs in the early 1890s, and the Nabis — with their emphasis on decorative surface, flat colour, and organic form — were natural collaborators. The chestnut tree, a common Parisian park tree, is rendered with the same respect for flat, interlocking pattern that characterises Vuillard's interior works of the period. The Dallas Museum of Art's holding documents the breadth of Vuillard's early decorative ambitions.

Cardboard absorbs the pigment to a matte finish ideal for a preparatory cartoon. Interlocking leaf masses are arranged as flat zones of green and ochre, the design thinking of stained-glass visible in the strong outlines and reduced modelling.