Georges Braque — Le Guéridon (1911) on Museum Wall

5 October 2017 · Paris

Le Guéridon, painted by Georges Braque in 1911, is Analytic Cubism at full intensity — fragmented planes of ochre and grey dissolving a pedestal table and violin into interlocking geometry. The painting commands the white gallery wall alone, its dark wood frame holding the controlled chaos at arm's length. Braque and Picasso were working so closely at this moment that their canvases were nearly indistinguishable; here the hand is unmistakably Braque's — architectural, deliberate, coolly systematic.