Still Life with Teapot

Still Life with Teapot from 1902, at the National Museum Cardiff, is a late work combining fruit with domestic pottery — the teapot a slightly unusual element in Cézanne's arrangements, which more typically featured bottles, jugs, and ginger pots. Wales's national collection holds this as one of a small number of works by which it represents French Post-Impressionism, and the Cardiff acquisition is a notable example of Cézanne reaching British public collections in the years just after his death in 1906.

The teapot's specific form — round body with projecting spout, handle, and lid — gives Cézanne a more complex object than his typical bottles and jugs. The multiple protrusions require him to navigate the transitions between surfaces with particular care using his characteristic directional strokes.