As he entered his mid forties, Paul Cézanne (1839–1906) decided to pay more attention to structure. His growing interest in rendering the volume of objects and distorting the picture plane is especially evident in still lifes, but can also be seen in outdoor scenes, in which the air itself seems almost solid – a world away from the shimmering atmospheres of the Impressionists. ‘Deal with nature as cylinders, spheres and cones,’ he wrote to the painter Émile Bernard in 1904. ‘Nature consists more of depth than of surface.’ This exhibition in Switzerland brings together some 80 oil paintings and watercolours from Cézanne’s late period, in which his undiminished appetite for formal experimentation and vivid use of colour are very much in evidence (25 January–25 May). Numerous depictions of his beloved Mont Sainte-Victoire in Provence are among the highlights of this show, which also includes portraits and lively scenes of bathers.
Find out more from the Fondation Beyeler’s website.
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