Picasso, who was probably more indebted to Cezanne than to any other single artist,once insisted that it was Cezanne's anxiety that impressed him above all. His contemporary Matisse, writing of a small Cezanne canvas he owned, claimed that it had 'sustained me spiritually in the critical moments of my career as an artist', but went on to admire 'the exceptional sobriety of its relationships'. Other artists, and successive generations of admirers and critics, have singled out Cezanne's fine and dramatic use of colour; his legendary concern with geometry, construction and picture-making; his obsessive relationship with certain landscape features, such as Mont Ste-Victoire, and his equally obsessive arrangements of still lifes; and even the obscure eroticism of his late paintings of bathers.

...

This volume on the life and work of Paul Cezanne (1839-1906) brings together for the first time a diverse and revealing selection of material, drawn from 800 paintings and 2,000 drawings and waterc01ours, and also from his correspondence and the memoirs of his fi'iends. Despite being one of the most influential nineteenth-century artists, Cezanne was far from being a conventional hero, and was ill at ease in the cafes and salons of the Paris art. world. His work shows a classical concern with forln and structure which sets it apart from the Impressionist mainstream, and led a subsequent generation of art historians to dub him the first 'Post-Impressionist'. This book provides fascinating evidence of the artist's friendships and family life and through his own writings and the reminiscences of his contemporaries shows the paradoxes and contradictions of his personality.

Illustrated with superb colour reproductions - landscapes, still lifes, portraits, nudes and studies from the Old Masters - Cezanne by Himself offers a rich treasury of material which gives us a new understanding of this great and truly innovative artist.

Acknowledgements

Preface

Introduction

1858-1874: The Early Years

1874-1886: The Years of Impressionism

1886-1897: The Years of Maturity

From Cezanne by Ambroise Vollard

1897-1906: The Late Work

Cezanne - Recorded by his

Contemporaries

From A Conversation with Cezanne

by Emile Bernard

From Cezanne in Aix by Jules Borely

From Le Dimanche avec Paul Cezanne

by Leo Larguier

From Some of Cezanne's Opinions

by Emile Bernard

From Cezanne by Joachim Gasquet

List of plates

Guide to the Principal Personalities

Mentioned in the Text

Further Reading

Text Sources