Fiona Bruce and Philip Mould head to France on the trail of two of the greatest Impressionist and post-Impressionist artists, Camille Pissarro and his friend and protege, Paul Cezanne.
Fiona travels to the stunning Provencal landscape on the trail of a simple watercolour, owned by Dominique Rogers. She is the great- great-niece of Anthony Valabregue, a poet, art critic and great personal friend of Cezanne who painted him several times. Dominique – who doesn’t admire Cezanne’s artistic style – believes the painting was a direct gift from Cezanne, passed on by Valabregue’s widow to her father in the 1920s.
Fiona visits Cezanne’s studio in his hometown of Aix-en-Provence and strolls in the nearby quarries in the shadow of Mont Sainte-Victoire, where the rich ochre-coloured boulders and spindly trees so influenced the artist’s work. Could this be where Dominique’s tree was painted?
Investigation into the paper and palette will prove crucial to establish the provenance, particularly after Fiona learns that Cezanne wasn’t copied in his lifetime. But what if an admirer or, even worse, a faker, meticulously copied it after his death?
Meanwhile Philip travels to northern France, to the town of Pontoise where Pissarro set up home with his large family and was often joined by other artists, including Cezanne. Pissarro had grown to love painting rural landscapes and the hard-working country folk tilling the soil.
