Most people know of the late Wayne Thiebaud as an Americana painter with a marked affection for confection, but a new exhibition opening next month at the Legion of Honor museum in San Francisco aims to capture the entirety of Thiebaud’s career as an artist, teacher, and, in his own words, an “obsessive thief.” From March 22 through August 17, Wayne Thiebaud: Art Comes from Art will unite the artist’s popular paintings of sumptuous candies, desserts, and more with influential works of art directly from his personal collection. It’s also billed as the first show to explore in-depth the artist’s “reinterpretations” of masterpieces by his artistic influences.Wayne Thiebaud, “A Sunday on La Grande Jatte” (2000)The exhibition highlights the intersection of the artist’s roles as an avid collector, life-long learner, and educator at the Sacramento Junior College and the University of California, Davis. Approximately 60 of Thiebaud’s works across his six-decade career are included in the show, which will feature 132 pieces in total.Through multiple loans from institutional and private collections as well as the Wayne Thiebaud Foundation (the exhibition’s biggest lender), the show began coming together in 2022 and the catalogue was completed and printed in 2024.Timothy Anglin Burgard, curator-in-charge of the American Art Department at Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco (FAMSF), told Hyperallergic via email that Thiebaud collected original works by the likes of Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, Paul Cézanne, Giorgio Morandi, Richard Diebenkorn, and many others throughout his lifetime.Left: Follower of Thomas Hill, “Bridal Veil Falls, Yosemite” (ca. 1900) (Collection of the Wayne Thiebaud Foundation) (photo by Michael Trask, courtesy Wayne Thiebaud Foundation)Right: Wayne Thiebaud, “Blue Ridge Mountain” (2010) (© Wayne Thiebaud Foundation / Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY)“Many of these works implicitly provided a counterpoint to modernism’s marginalization or rejection of artists deemed to be outdated, and explicitly served as sources of inspiration and challenge,” Burgard continued.“Thiebaud’s art collection also enabled him to join an extended community of artists, both living and deceased, and to engage in a dialogue with their artworks,” Burgard said, adding that the artist’s copies allowed him to channel the methods and motivations of those before him.Thiebaud’s 2000 copy of Georges Seurat’s “A Sunday on La Grande Jatte — 1884” (1884–86) and other work lifting or conglomerating from the likes of Jacob van Hulsdonck, Henri Fantin-Latour, Edgar Degas, Edward Hopper, and painters of the Hudson River School, will be displayed alongside printed renditions of the originals he explicitly references, outlining how the artist “steals” directly from art European and American art history. Wayne Thiebaud “Supine Woman” (1963) (Photo by Robert LaPrelle)Emphasizing Thiebaud’s fervor for not just emulating Old Masters by embodying their processes but also passing along his and his predecessors’ knowledge to generations of artists to come, Burgard shared a quote attributed to the artist:“I think we have a misconception about where painting comes from. It’s not a hermetic activity. It doesn’t come from an individual. It’s a communal, commemorative, very layered activity that comes from groups of people. If you think of painting’s history, you find these enclaves of people who worked together, who helped each other, who depended on each other. You need confrontation, you need critical interrogation.”Thiebaud maintained his studio practice up until his death in 2021 at the age of 101.Wayne Thiebaud, “Cakes & Pies” (1994–95) Collection of the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, Missouri (photo by E. G. Schempf)Wayne Thiebaud, “Betty Jean Thiebaud and Book” (1965–69), Crocker Art MuseumWayne Thiebaud, “Five Seated Figures” (1965)