Wayne Thiebaud (1920–2021) is considered one of the greatest and most original American artists of the twentieth century. This richly illustrated and scholarly catalogue accompanies the first-ever museum exhibition of his work in the United Kingdom, opening at The Courtauld Gallery, London in October 2025. The exhibition focuses on one of the most significant aspects of his career: his late 1950s and 1960s paintings and drawings of the (mainly) edible delights of modern America, from cakes and ice creams to burgers and gumballs.
Wayne Thiebaud: American Still Life will showcase the ways in which Thiebaud recast the genre of still life for the modern age and created powerful images of American consumer culture in the years of post-war expansion and optimism. It will chart the moment when Thiebaud found his artistic voice, creating a highly original way of painting and drawing in order to express his vision of modern American consumer culture, which he considered to be a vital subject for contemporary painting.
Thiebaud saw his work as continuing the radical legacy of earlier still-life paintings by Chardin, Manet, Cézanne and others. He 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.
The exhibition and catalogue will feature rarely lent works from private collections and major museum collections in the USA, including the National Gallery of Art, Washington, and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, as well as the Wayne Thiebaud Foundation.
Wayne Thiebaud: American Still Life
Edited by Barnaby Wright and Karen Serres
with contributions from Rachel Teagle, Richard Shiff, Lucy Bradnock and Chloe Nahum
October 2025
Hardback, 250 x 260 mm
160 pages, 80 illustrations
ISBN: 978-1-913645-89-2Exhibition
The Courtauld Gallery, London
10 October 2025 – 18 January 2026In the press
★★★★★ "A succulent and incredibly moreish slice of a long-lost American dream" —Guardian
★★★★★ "Irresistible and brilliantly peculiar" —Telegraph
★★★★★ "Wayne Thiebaud’s luscious displays of iced cakes and slices of meringue-filled pies are gloriously, irresistibly lickable." —i paper
"No artist has ever more brilliantly captured the idea that such a trivial object can be beautiful, that it can be – and of course would become a thousand times over in his paintings – the stuff of art." —Observer
"Lush" —Apollo
"Hot dogs, soda bottles and gumball machines all received the high-art treatment; whipped confections, rendered in creamy paint, look almost good enough to eat. These make for ravishing viewing" —Financial Times
"Thiebaud’s optimistic but wistful paintings chart the beginning of a decade of anxiety that challenged and changed American identity in a way that resonates anew today." —Art Newspaper
"For Thiebaud ... a pie was never just a pie nor a hot dog just a sausage in a roll. His deceptively simple pictures became an integral dish in the buffet of modern American art." —New Statesman
About the authors
Dr Barnaby Wright is Deputy Head of the Courtauld Gallery, London, and the Daniel Katz Curator of 20th-Century Art.
Dr Karen Serres is Senior Curator of Paintings at the Courtauld Gallery, London.
Dr Chloe Nahum is the Bridget Riley Art Foundation Curatorial Fellow at the Courtauld Gallery, London.
Dr Rachel Teagle is Founding Director at the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, UC Davis.
Professor Richard Shiff is Effie Marie Cain Regents Chair in Art at the University of Texas at Austin.
Dr Lucy Bradnock is Reader in Modern and Contemporary Art at The Courtauld Institute of Art, London.