Still LIfe in front of the Window 1920

Louis Marcoussis painted this still life, featuring a guitar, fruit, and distant landscape, with gouache on paper. At its heart lies a ripe fruit, halved to reveal its seeds, a motif echoing the ancient symbol of fertility and regeneration, seen across cultures. Consider its lineage: from the pomegranate offered to Persephone in Greek myth, a harbinger of cyclical rebirth, to the Christian symbolism of seeds representing spiritual growth. Here, the fruit sits alongside a guitar, an emblem of harmony and creative expression. The window in the background evokes Caspar David Friedrich's Romantic landscapes, where nature serves as a mirror to the soul. Note that the window frames are painted in green, a color of transition that links the conscious world of the still life with the infinite realm of creative vision.