On June 12th, Jean-Siméon Chardin’s Le Melon entamé (The Cut Melon) (1760) sold for €26.73 million ($28.76 million) at Christie’s Old Masters sale in Paris. The sale smashed the painting’s estimated value of €8 million–€12 million ($8.57 million–$12.8 million). According to the auction house, this sale set new auction records for both Chardin’s work and 18th-century French Old Master paintings.
A master of still lifes, Chardin captured intimate scenes and domestic interiors in his vivid paintings. These genre paintings, characterized by impasto techniques and soft lighting, were influenced by 17th-century Dutch still lifes—though Chardin himself was French and lived in Paris for his entire life.
Le Melon entamé was first exhibited in 1761 at the annual salon of the Académie de Peintures et de Sculptures in Paris. The work and its former companion, Le bocal d’abricots (The Jar of Apricots) (1761), were particularly noted for their oval canvases, which were rarely used by Chardin before or after. Originally acquired by Jacques Roettiers, a goldsmith to Louis XV, the painting was later owned by François Marcille in 1802 and entered the Rothschild collection in 1876, where it has remained until now.
In March 2022, another Chardin painting, Le Panier de fraises des bois (The Basket of Wild Strawberries) (1761), fetched €24.38 million ($26.89 million) at an Artcurial auction in Paris. Purchased by New York art dealer Adam Williams on behalf of the Kimbell Art Museum, this piece previously set the record for the highest auction price for Chardin and French Old Masters. This February, the Louvre acquired the painting after raising €24.38 million ($26.89 million) to do so, with the support of approximately 10,000 donors, including luxury brand LVMH.
