Oil painting by Wayne Thiebaud featuring three rows of circular cakes on a light blue table

Now open – The Griffin Catalyst Exhibition: Wayne Thiebaud. American Still Life

10 Oct 2025

The first UK museum exhibition on American artist Wayne Thiebaud is now open at The Courtauld Gallery (10 Oct 2025 – 18 Jan 2026)

One of the most original American artists of the 20th century, Wayne Thiebaud developed a unique style of painting to express his vision of post-war American culture through its everyday objects.

The Griffin Catalyst Exhibition: Wayne Thiebaud. American Still Life focuses on Thiebaud’s break-out works of the 1960s that made his reputation, bringing together some of the greatest paintings the artists produced during this remarkable period – lush and captivating depictions of quintessential modern American subjects from cherry pies, hot dogs and candy counters to gumball dispensers and pinball machines. With these works, Thiebaud recast the genre of still life for the modern era.

“Each era produces its own still life” – Wayne Thiebaud, 1962

Thiebaud considered the everyday objects of American life to be a vital subject for contemporary art, and he saw his work as continuing the radical legacy of earlier still-life paintings by Chardin, Manet, Cézanne and others. Thiebaud believed in the importance of commonplace objects that might otherwise be overlooked or considered kitsch. His work turns hot dogs, lemon meringue pies and glossy cream cakes into the stuff of profound modern painting.   

Thiebaud lived and worked most of his life in Sacramento, California, and was a longstanding teacher at nearby University of California, Davis. In the 1940s and 1950s, before becoming a painter, he worked as an illustrator, cartoonist and art director, including a summer spent in the animation department of Walt Disney Studios and a role as a graphic designer for the US army as part of his military service during the Second World War.

In 1956, Thiebaud travelled to New York to meet the avant-garde artists working there. William de Koonig was especially inspirational and encouraged him to find his own voice and subjects as a modern painter. Back in Sacramento, he began painting commonplace objects of American life, largely from memory, and soon crystallised his unique approach, isolating his richly painted subjects against spare backgrounds. In 1962, he would, after much rejection, stage his first solo show at the Allan Stone Gallery – an overnight success, propelling him into the limelight. Important collectors and institutions, including the Museum of Modern Art, purchased works and the exhibition sold out. From there, Thiebaud would go on to become one of the major figures of 20th-century American art.

The exhibition features rarely lent works from major museums and private collections in the United States. Highlights include Thiebaud’s epic painting Cakes, lent for the first time outside the US by the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., and Four Pinball Machines, one of his most significant works in a private collection. Other major loans include works from the Whitney Museum of Art, New York; the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.; and the Fine Art Museums of San Francisco, among others. The exhibition also benefits from generous loans from the Wayne Thiebaud Foundation in Sacramento.

An accompanying display in the Gilbert and Ildiko Butler Drawings Gallery, Wayne Thiebaud. Delights, focuses on the artist’s celebrated 1965 portfolio of 17 exquisite etchings to offer further insight into his still-life motifs and work as a graphic artist.

The exhibition is curated by Dr Karen Serres, Senior Curator of Paintings, and Dr Barnaby Wright, Deputy Head of The Courtauld Gallery and Daniel Katz Curator of 20th-Century Art. It is accompanied by a richly illustrated catalogue showcasing new research on Thiebaud’s still lifes, with contributions from leading scholars.

Tickets to Abstract Erotic include entry to Wayne Thiebaud. Delights and the permanent collection.

The Griffin Catalyst Exhibition: Wayne Thiebaud. American Still Life
10 Oct 2025 – 18 Jan 2026
Denise Coates Exhibition Galleries, Floor 3

Title Supporter: Griffin Catalyst
Supported by Kenneth C. Griffin and the Wayne Thiebaud Exhibition Circle

Wayne Thiebaud. Delights
10 Oct 2025 – 18 Jan 2026
Gilbert and Ildiko Butler Drawings Gallery, Floor 1

The programme of displays in the Drawings Gallery is generously supported by the International Music and Art Foundation, with additional support from James Bartos.

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