Still Life: Pot, Onions, Bread and Green Apples - Meijer de Haan

A rustic still life by Dutch Post-Impressionist Meijer de Haan, featuring a ceramic pot, onions, and bread rendered with bold, expressive brushwork.

Meijer de Haan, a Dutch painter who spent his final years in Brittany, produced this still life during his association with Paul Gauguin at Le Pouldu. The composition features a rustic earthenware pot, a collection of onions, a loaf of bread, and green apples arranged upon a white cloth. The work reflects the influence of the Pont-Aven School, where artists moved away from naturalistic representation toward a more expressive, simplified application of paint.

The artist employs a heavy, tactile brushwork that defines the volume of the objects. The colour palette remains grounded in earthy tones, with the ochre of the onions and the deep brown of the ceramic vessel contrasting against the cool, pale blue of the cloth. De Haan avoids fine detail, opting instead for bold forms that occupy the space with a sense of weight and presence. The lighting is directional, casting shadows that anchor the objects to the surface and create a sense of physical mass.

This painting demonstrates the shift in De Haan's practice as he moved from his earlier, more academic Dutch style toward the synthetic approach favoured by his contemporaries in France. The arrangement of everyday items serves as a study in form and texture, demonstrating a focus on the material quality of the subjects. The composition is contained and stable, with the circular forms of the onions and the pot providing a rhythmic structure across the canvas. The work remains a representative example of the artist's period in Brittany, where he experimented with the expressive potential of colour and simplified shapes, moving beyond mere observation to create a cohesive, unified image.