Cezanne in Provence

Provence was Cezanne’s country: he was at home there as nowhere else. His sense of being grounded in so particular and so familiar a place, resonant with memory and emotion, caused him to concentrate much of his extraordinary pictoral intelligence there and to create from that landscape some of the most remarkable and original images in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century art. Nature was Cezanne’s inspiration throughout his career, and he sought to be a worthy interpreter of the beauty he saw in the Provençal landscape. It was his goal to convey his visual sensations of color, light, and space in the medium of paint, and he succeeded magnificently, producing works of compelling tactile quality and coloristic beauty. In the distinctive country side around his native Aix-en-Provence, Cezanne found the images rich in natural beauty and in emotion that have since become synonymous with his art. Cezanne created some of his most compelling images in the solitude of Provence, including not only landscapes painted outdoors but also portraits and still lifes. Throughout his career, Provence remained a constant source of strength in his struggle to master the means of artistic expression. Other artists had come to paint the Provençal landscape before him but Cezanne made his corner of Provence uniquely his own, adopting motifs and view that convey a powerful sense of place.