Breakfast Pieces are a sub-genre of still-life painting. First made in the Dutch Golden Age of early market capitalism, they depict food typically consumed for breakfast. Dialectically to the still-life collection at Poilâne bakery, these Dutch paintings immortalized the goods and wealth of the period, whereas local french painters of post war Paris, exchanged their „nature morte“ for bread, in order not to starve.

After World War II, Pierre Poilâne commissioned artists in precarious situations to paint his product – bread – and in return he would pay them in said subjects. Two things stand out in these still-lifes, their locality, and their modesty. Not only do they depict local products, but they are also painted by local artists. The motif of the bread-loafs and other basic ingredients of a simple meal, like butter, cheese, water or wine, represent the diet of a post-war dazed Paris.

Over the years the collection of „nature morte" paintings has grown at Poilâne’s semi-public breakfast room, an ensemble adding a humble view to the genre of still-life painting, exemplifying an alternative to the market economy. Anna Paul has integrated her own work here, a mise en abyme representing the collection, its historicity and the cultural mechanisms of its formation.

Photography by Viktor Shekrulatz

Breakfast Pieces are a sub-genre of still-life painting. First made in the Dutch Golden Age of early market capitalism, they depict food typically consumed for breakfast. Dialectically to the still-life collection at Poilâne bakery, these Dutch paintings immortalized the goods and wealth of the period, whereas local french painters of post war Paris, exchanged their „nature morte“ for bread, in order not to starve.

After World War II, Pierre Poilâne commissioned artists in precarious situations to paint his product – bread – and in return he would pay them in said subjects. Two things stand out in these still-lifes, their locality, and their modesty. Not only do they depict local products, but they are also painted by local artists. The motif of the bread-loafs and other basic ingredients of a simple meal, like butter, cheese, water or wine, represent the diet of a post-war dazed Paris.

Over the years the collection of „nature morte" paintings has grown at Poilâne’s semi-public breakfast room, an ensemble adding a humble view to the genre of still-life painting, exemplifying an alternative to the market economy. Anna Paul has integrated her own work here, a mise en abyme representing the collection, its historicity and the cultural mechanisms of its formation.

Photography by Viktor Shekrulatz

Breakfast Pieces are a sub-genre of still-life painting. First made in the Dutch Golden Age of early market capitalism, they depict food typically consumed for breakfast. Dialectically to the still-life collection at Poilâne bakery, these Dutch paintings immortalized the goods and wealth of the period, whereas local french painters of post war Paris, exchanged their „nature morte“ for bread, in order not to starve.

After World War II, Pierre Poilâne commissioned artists in precarious situations to paint his product – bread – and in return he would pay them in said subjects. Two things stand out in these still-lifes, their locality, and their modesty. Not only do they depict local products, but they are also painted by local artists. The motif of the bread-loafs and other basic ingredients of a simple meal, like butter, cheese, water or wine, represent the diet of a post-war dazed Paris.

Over the years the collection of „nature morte" paintings has grown at Poilâne’s semi-public breakfast room, an ensemble adding a humble view to the genre of still-life painting, exemplifying an alternative to the market economy. Anna Paul has integrated her own work here, a mise en abyme representing the collection, its historicity and the cultural mechanisms of its formation.

Photography by Viktor Shekrulatz

With Arbel, Baro, Bermond, Besset, Bousier, Cheval, Clebert, Coulon, Cuernveur, Dalì, Desnoettes, Delègues, Georges, Girard, Font:anarosa, Fous, Frano, Harburger, Hilbert, Iselin, Kaminski, Kristo, Lanauve, Lemonie, Lepape, Lona, Madikem, Majan, Martin, Mngahin, Paul, Philip, Plisson, Reil, Rive, Savignon, Thiebaut, Vergnier, Wolff, ZaroPhotography by Viktor Shekrulatz