Pear, grapes and nuts

James Ensor spent almost his whole life in the Belgian seaside town of Ostend, painting above his family's shop, which sold shells, fans and carnival masks to summer tourists. By 1889 he was already the painter of jeering crowds and grinning masks, and the huge canvas he had just made of Christ entering a modern Brussels had been turned away even by Les XX, the progressive Brussels circle he had helped found. This small panel belongs to the calmer side of that same studio. A single pear, a few grapes and some nuts sit close to the eye, worked in thick, restless paint that catches the light. Painting fruit was how Ensor studied colour and surface without an audience to shock. He kept the panel tiny, barely larger than a sheet of paper.