Paul Cézanne was a French painter. He was one of the most influential artists of the late nineteenth century. Initially considered under the umbrella of the Impressionists, he moved beyond this description and formed a link between Impressionism and that which came after. His works are commonly known as Post-impressionist.
Cézanne was born in 1839 in Aix-en-Provence, a small city in the south of France. He went to school there and became friends with the renowned author-to-be Émile Zola. At the age of 18 he began attending a drawing school in Aix, but then went on to study law as his father wished. During this time he continued drawing lessons and at the end of his degree, encouraged by his friend Zola, moved to Paris to pursue his art. In Paris, at the Academie Suisse, he met Camille Pissarro, who was just beginning his own career. At the beginning of the Franco-Prussian war in 1870, Cézanne left Paris, like many others (Monet and Pissarro went to London), to avoid being called up to fight. However, the war was short lived and Cézanne moved back to the Paris region after the birth of his first son, living in Auvers. Pissarro lived in nearby Pontoise and the two often painted together maintaining their close friendship. Cézanne looked up to the older Pissarro, considering himself his pupil. Through the 1870s, Cézanne split his time between Paris and his home region of Provence in the south. From the 1880s he lived and painted mainly in Provence. Cézanne lived long enough to begin to get recognition for his work during the final years of his life. He died in 1906.
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From the 1880s Cézanne worked mainly away from Paris, in his birth region of Provence. He developed several regular subjects including Mont Sainte-Victoire, a mountain near which his brother-in-law had a house, and L’Estaque, a nearby coastal town. He also continued to paint scenes of his father’s estate at Jas de Bouffan, which was left to him on his father’s death in 1886.
In 1885, Cézanne’s childhood friend, Émile Zola, now a renowned author, published the novel L’Oeuvre. It focused on the Paris art scene, and its main protagonist, the artist Claude Lantier, was largely based on Cézanne. The novel is a perceptive reflection of the scene; Zola had been very much a part of it as an art critic and friend of the artists. However, Zola appears at times to be critical of Lantier (i.e. Cézanne), or rather, he suggests that (due to failings in his character) Cézanne had never managed to achieve his potential. Zola sent a copy of the novel to Cézanne. Cézanne thanked him for it, but their relationship appears to have deteriorated to the point of no return following this.
See more details in the other videos on this channel:
Paul Cézanne: The Early Years (1866-1878)
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Paul Cézanne | 1895 - 1906 | The Late Years
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Learn more about Cézanne and his works at the Courtauld Gallery in London here [ Ссылка ] @HENITalks
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