Wayne Thiebaud

signed and dated 1962 (upper left) and signed (on the stretcher)

61.4 by 45.7 cm. 24⅛ by 18 in.

Allan Stone Gallery, New York (acquired by exchange with the artist)

Mr. and Mrs. Alan Slifka, New York

Vanderwould and Tanenbaum Gallery, New York

John Berggruen Gallery, San Francisco (acquired from the above in 1985)

Private Collection (acquired from the above in 1987)

Sotheby's, New York, 9 May 2011, Lot 35

Acquavella Galleries, New York

Acquired directly from the above by the present owner

New York, Allan Stone Gallery, Wayne Thiebaud: Recent Paintings, April - May 1962

Pasadena, Pasadena Art Museum; Minneapolis, Walker Art Center; San Francisco, San Francisco Museum of Art; Cincinnati, The Contemporary Arts Center; Salt Lake City, Utah Museum of Fine Arts of the University of Utah, Wayne Thiebaud, February - October 1968, cat. no. 8

New York, Allan Stone Gallery, Wayne Thiebaud: Four Decades with Allan Stone Gallery, May - July 2001, no. 42 (exhibition listing)

New York, Allan Stone Gallery, Bay Area to New York, October - December 2009

San Francisco, Legion of Honor, Wayne Thiebaud: Art Comes from Art, 22 March - 17 August 2025

Embodying Thiebaud's lifelong fascination with whimsical objects and enticing treats, Sucker Tree from 1962 is deeply imbued with a sense of wonder and delight. Depicted on a towering sweet stand - lollipops of various pattern and colour stand to attention in this burst of bright confectionary joy. Thick swirls of pastel paint bring this nostalgic painting to life, with brushstrokes embodying the delicious, sweet forms created with each luscious application of paint. Thiebaud's characteristic approach to light and shadow

gives them a three-dimensional vitality; each candy disc seems to glow from within, animated by his mastery of pigment and brushwork.

Thiebaud began his artistic career in advertising in the 1940s, painting signs and cartoons for adverts and billboards. The consistency and repetition of his output surrounding items of consumerism allowed Thiebaud to form an affinity with clean lines, bold eye-catching colours and mass-produced imagery which formed the basis of his work as a fine artist. Thiebaud was drawn to objects of nostalgia and simplicity. Confectionery items like slices of pie or neatly arranged cakes reminded him of classic American diners, bakeries, and childhood experiences. In 1962, Thiebaud's work was featured in the pioneering exhibition New Painting of Common Objects at the Pasadena Art Museum, curated by Walter Hopps and widely recognized as the first museum show of American Pop Art. That same year, he held his debut New York show at the Allan Stone Gallery, marking the beginning of a lasting professional partnership between Thiebaud and the gallerist.

Items of intrigue, such as cakes and confectionery, were part of a shared cultural memory for Thiebaud, making them universally familiar yet deeply personal. Despite their playful appearance, Thiebaud painted these treats as serious exercises in form, colour, light and shadow. Thiebaud was influenced by the geometry of cakes and sweets, and the counters and crockery these items were displayed on. He enjoyed the challenge of painting shiny, sugary textures, beads of dripping condensation and cold food on the verge of melting. Using bakeries and candy store displays as his direct inspiration, Thiebaud delighted in the uniform chaos of sweet arranged in rows, jars and drawers, all heightened to vibrant and intense colours by the shop's glowing lights.

While often linked to Pop Artists due to their shared handling of mass-produced objects, Thiebaud's iterations of classically American consumer goods are fond explorations in repetition and variation rather than a detached critique on standardization. In doing so, he imbues the commonplace with the heroic. Thiebaud himself commented on his affection for the uniformity of American foodstuffs, saying 'It interests me because of the consciousness of simultaneity - of how much alike we are, how close we are to one another and how rare it is to come across distinctions of any sort..it's familiar and also funny; it tells us how gregarious and how close we really are. That's very comforting.' (Wayne Thiebaud quoted in: Exh. Cat., Pasadena Art Museum, Wayne Thiebaud, 1968, p. 26)

In Sucker Tree, Thiebaud reinvents the traditional still-life genre to reflect the age of mass production and consumption, retaining a nuanced dialogue with art history while deftly capturing the spirited exuberance and prosperity of 1960s America. With this goal, Thiebaud paints items taken from window displays and store counters, mass-produced items from manufacturing concerns in America and brings them to the forefront of representation within his creative output. Kaleidoscopic and jewel-like, Sucker Tree presents the artist's most enduring sweets as replete with subtle and gestural indications of materiality whilst highlighting the consequential interaction with light, which further serves to emphasize their tantalizing tactility. Set upon a plain background, broken with a two tone table top, Thiebaud's brushwork creates rich textural detail that dances about his subject matter. Meanwhile, the artist's signature blue shadows dance up the wall behind the lollipop tree, pushing the sweets into the foreground and enticing close to touch.

Over the course of his illustrious seven-decade career, Thiebaud used depictions of everyday items, food and landscapes as a metaphor for American prosperity, consumerism and cultural identity. Sucker Tree is the epitome of such ideology, created almost like consumer theatre, drawing out the aesthetic of sugar and it's ability to evoke nostalgia and irresistible charm. Coinciding with the opening of the major retrospective Wayne Thiebaud, American Still Life, at the Courtauld Gallery this October, Sotheby's are thrilled to be offering Sucker Tree for sale this season.