Cezanne

Post-Impressionism
 Cezanne
• Father was stock broker
• Cezanne trained as lawyer, while attending
drawing academy
• Studied in Paris, painted in Impressionists style,
but was rejected at 1874 Impressionists
exhibition
• Went back home (Aix-en -Provence) to continue
painting in obscurity
• Impressionists used colour to dissolve form, He
used patches of colour to build it up.
 Cezanne as Impressionist

• He was largely untrained so his early work was

crude compared to other Impressionists.
 Cezanne as Post-Impressionist

• Cézanne's grasp of form and solid pictorial structures

came to dominate his mature style.
• His overriding concern with form and structure set him
apart from the Impressionists from the start.
 Composition and Solid Form

• The subject of the work is less important than a well

constructed design and solid forms.
Composition and Solid Form
 Composition and Solid Form

• The main objects are arranged roughly in a triangle or

pyramid.
 Composition and Solid Form

• He paints still-life, landscape, and the figure as if there is a

permanent geometry (cones, cylinders, & spheres) under the surface.
Jug and Fruit 1906
 Squarish Patches

• Cezanne uses flat squarish patches of colour to serve two purposes:

1) To create a 2D surface for compositional unity, and
2) To suggest separate planes that shape 3D solidity and space.
Still-life with Onions 1895
• Painted over a long period of time ( often fruit rotted - replaced with wax
fruit)
• Forms based on basic geometric forms - cylinder, cubes, cones, & spheres.
• Design most imp. - distorts for design - more imp. than imitation of objects.
 Works like Still-Life with Onions are often seen
from multiple perspectives.
 Subject
• Form & composition, with colour used to achieve both
• Actual subject not as imp. as solid and unified qualities of work as whole
 Perspective
• Not sitting in same position each time
• Influenced Cubism
 Composition
• Objects, and direction of line are carefully placed for overall asymmetrical
balance.
• He will even tilt objects to add to flow of composition.
 Colour
• Warm hues of fruit contrast cool of surroundings.
• Warm colours advance and cool colours recede.
Still-life with Plaster Cast 1895
 Still-life with Plaster Cast 1895

Subject

• Domestic Still-life
objects combined
with dramatic
baroque sculpture
(art history)
 Still-life with Plaster Cast 1895

• Plaster cupid by Puget

is a plaster copy (copy
of a copy) & in the
background is a
painting of a copy of
The Flayed Man (copy
of copy of copy)
 Still-life with Plaster Cast 1895

• Tension between
foreground and
background
• Which is real &
which is illusion?
 Still-life with Plaster Cast 1895

• There is a tension
between two
dimensional
qualities and three
dimensional
qualities.
 Still-life with Plaster Cast 1895

• Painting contains
subtle shifts of
perspective due to
long period of
painting
• The artists position
changes so
perspective
changes.
 Still-life with Plaster Cast 1895

• The apple placed in

background floor is
same scale as
foreground apples.
• Traditional scale &
perspective are
intentionally ignored
in order to balance
the composition.
Mont Sainte-Victoire, 1904
 Mont Sainte-Victoire

• Part of a series painted more than 30 times

• The mountain dominates landscape
 Mont Sainte-Victoire, 1904

• Form - Distorted, reduced to pyramid shape

(geometry)
 Mont Sainte-Victoire, 1904

• Perspective- wanted canvas to remain flat, so

he didn't use traditional aerial perspective
 Mont Sainte-Victoire, 1904

• Space - depth achieve through contrast of warm & cool colour

• Compressed space - foreground, middle ground & background
painted with same intensity, and similar squarish patches of colour
• Canvas maintains flat quality - sky seems as close as foreground
 Mont Sainte-Victoire, 1904

• Colour- Felt free to adjust relationships of colour

(distort) for design sake.
• Modulated - colours and values distributed to produce
visual balance