Cardplayers 1

#89001     48″ X 66″      oc     24″ X 33″     Print

• Cezanne: “Cardplayers” ( 1890 – 92 )
• Chagall: “Le Soldar Boit” ( 1912 )
• Picasso: “Boy with Pipe” ( 1905 )
• Lautree: “Yvette Salue le Publique” ( 1894 )

Cardplayers by Paul Cezanne (1839 – 1906) gives Chen a striking opportunity to shoot off fireworks. He can play as many combinations as there are in a deck of cards.

Retaining one cardplayer from Cezanne, Chen transforms two others, replacing one with a figure from Picasso’s Blue Period and the other with an extravagant Cubist soldier by Chagall.

While the main background figure is Toulouse-Lautrec’s Yvette Guilbert, other puzzling icons can be found.

If jokers are wild, the blue boy has just played four aces, which is the kind of hand that Chen plays all the time.

– Lawrence Jeppson )