No. 115. The Basket of Fruit. A friend of his, a painter living in the countryside not far from his studio, had suddenly begun to make shaped canvases. Abstract shaped canvases. He thought they were really exquisite. He loved the idea of shapedness, and wanted to try his hand at it, but since he'd never painted an entirely non-representational canvas in his life, he decided he'd have a go at making shaped still life paintings. His first was a big basket of fruit--in grisaille.