Paul Cezanne (b. Jan. 19, 1839, Aix-en-Provence, Fr.- d. Oct.
22, 1906, Aix-en-Provence) was a
French painter, one of the greatest of the Postimpressionists, whose works
and ideas were influential in the aesthetic development of many 20th-century
artists and art movements, especially Cubism. Cézanne's art, misunderstood
and discredited by the public during most of his life, grew out of Impressionism
and eventually challenged all the conventional values of painting in the
19th century through its insistence on personal expression and on the integrity
of the painting itself. He has been called the father of modern painting.
His art is conveniently divided into three phases. In the early 1870s, through
a mutually helpful association with Pissarro, with whom he painted outside
Paris at Auvers, he assimilated the principles of color and lighting of Impressionism
and loosened up his brushwork; yet he retained his own sense of mass and the
interaction of planes.
cezanne@art.artsmarket.co.uk