Cezanne watercolour of a melon sells for £11 million

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Cezanne's Nature Morte au Melon Vert exceeded its expected price of £7-9 million and sold for £11.4 million when it went under the hammer at Sotheby's sale of Impressionist and Modern Art in New York.

The painting, which measures 18.75 inches by 12.35 inches, is a late work dating from 1902-06 and depicts shades of green in a melon.

Cezanne: Watercolour sells for £11 million at Sotheby's

Sotheby's has offered the work for sale twice before - once in the 1978 sale of the Robert von Hirsch collection and again in the sale of the British Rail Pension Fund in 1989 when it sold for £2.56 million.

It was sold on behalf of Giuseppe Eskenazi, one of the world's most distinguished art dealers, who specialises in Chinese art and has a gallery off Bond Street, in London.

A Sotheby's spokeswoman said the sale of Cezanne's Nature Morte au Melon Vert was "a record for a work on paper by the artist at auction."

The watercolour is described in Sotheby's catalogue as "an outstanding example of Cezanne's still-lifes, demonstrating the extraordinary freedom and audacity of style, and the confidence and assured quality of the artist's technique that characterised his late years."

The late art historian John Rewald described the work in his studies of Cezanne.

He said: "A green melon, while not the central element of the composition, nevertheless constitutes its focus.

"It is flanked on one side by an undefined object, possibly a mending-basket with white linen, and on the other by a branch with leaves, presumably of an almond tree.

"The vivid texture of this branch contrasts with the large, circular shape of the melon.

"Further contrasts are provided by a blue glass in front of the melon, as well as by a single, small round fruit, an apple or peach, whose yellow and red colours introduce a special accent. There is no preparatory pencil sketch."

He added that the background showed "more or less regular, vertical stripes" and said several holes in the four corners can be interpreted as a sign that Cezanne devoted several sittings to works such as this.