Notes

Empty utensils: jug, spoon and saucer are placed on the edge of a table. A vase with anemones dominates at the corner's edge. At the slightest pull of the cloth the arrangement will topple over and disappear into the void.

On the table in front of these objects a blue bowl with green figs is the focal point. It matches the anemones. Figs, classified as fruit, are flowers. With the anemones they belong to the domain of Lan Ts'ai ho, the sixth of the Eight Chinese Immortals. He wore a blue cloak, carrying a basket with flowers and sang of the brevity of life and the fleeting nature of pleasure (see: J E Cirlot. A Dictionary of Symbols).

In Still Life with a Bowl of Figs the blue bowl with its fig-flowers echoes Lan Tsai ho's song...

Elza Miles

Provenance

Sotheby Parke Bernet South Africa (Pty) Ltd, Johannesburg, 3 March 1975, lot 172