The Kimbell Art Museum has acquired The Cut Melon (1760), a still life by Jean Siméon Chardin, from the Rothschild family, after an auction sale last year in Paris fell through. The work went on view at the Fort Worth, Texas institution on 22 May in the gallery devoted to French still lifes from the 17th to the 19th centuries.
“The Cut Melon is one of the great masterpieces of 18th-century French painting,” says the Kimbell’s director Eric Lee, who negotiated the deal with the Rothschild family, adding: “It is no secret that we have long hoped for a great Chardin still life for the Kimbell.”
The painting was sold at auction by Christie’s in Paris in June 2024 for a record €26.7m, the highest price ever obtained for a French 18th-century painting and the most expensive Old Master work ever sold in France, the company boasted at the time. Unfortunately the winning bidder, an Italian real estate promoter based in Saint Moritz, Switzerland named Nanni Bassani Antivari, never paid a cent. Christie’s sued him in Paris, asking for compensation of €195,000.
The Rothschild family took the panel back and sold it directly to the Kimbell, leaving the auction house aside. The price tag has not been disclosed, but The Art Newspaper understands it is somewhat lower than the Christie’s hammer price of €23m, but much more than the auction house’s estimate of €8m to €12m.
The Kimbell was the underbidder at the auction, and its failure to take home the work was its second such disappointment over a Chardin painting. Just one year before, at Artcurial, the museum was the winning bidder for a different still life of the same period by Chardin, showing a platter of wild strawberries. However, its export was blocked and the work was purchased by the Musée du Louvre for a staggering €24.3m thanks to a wide-ranging crowdfunding campaign.
The Cut Melon, which has kept its original frame since its exhibition at the Royal Academy’s Salon in 1761, comes from legendary collections. It formed a pair with a painting of a jar of apricots in brandy, acquired by the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto in 1962. Both compositions share a rare oval shape. The pair was purchased by King Louis XV’s goldsmith Jacques Roëttiers, before joining the collection founded by François Martial Marcille, an early admirer of Chardin. It was bought at Drouot from the Marcilles’ inheritance in 1876 by Charlotte de Rothschild, the widow of baron Nathaniel de Rothschild. Both still lifes stayed in the family until their sale.
