Nature morte, pot à lait et fruits sur une table (Still life with milk pot and fruits on a table)

This circa 1890 canvas of a milk pot and fruits on a table, held in Oslo, is a characteristic example of Cézanne's domestic still life in its mature phase. The milk pot — a plain ceramic vessel — joins fruit on a table surface that already shows his characteristic slight instability, the plane tilting forward in defiance of strict perspective. His domestic objects are always specific: this is a real pot from his kitchen, observed from multiple angles simultaneously. The Oslo canvas documents the mature still life method that would directly influence Picasso's first Cubist still lifes a decade and a half later.

The milk pot is rendered as a cylindrical volume built through color modulation — light and dark passages that describe its form through hue variation rather than tonal shading. The surrounding fruit is analyzed with equal care. The unstable table surface, tilting slightly forward, is characteristic of his mature spatial approach.