CÉZANNE:ABOLISHING THE TYRANNY OF LINEAR PERSPECTIVE…. FOREVER

Catagorizing the style of Paul Cézanne’s( 1839-1906 )  artwork is problematic. As a young man he left his home in Provence in the south of France in order to join with the avant-garde in Paris. He fell in with the circle of young painters that surrounded Manet, he had been a childhood friend of the novelist, Emile Zola, who championed Manet, and he even showed at the 1st Impressionist exhibition, held at Nadar’s studio in 1874. However, Cézanne didn’t quite fit in with the group. Whereas many other painters of this circle were concerned primarily with the effects of light and reflected color , Cézanne remained deeply committed to form.

Cezanne. Blue Landscape. 1904-06"He sometimes worked on the same picture for years, never satisfied with the results. He seldom signed his works, because he never considered them finished. Those he did sign had his mark of approval.  During the last decade of his life, Cézanne's paintings became more simplified, the objects in his landscapes reduced to components -- cylinders, cones and spheres. He is often seen as anticipating cubist and abstract art, because he reduced the imperfect forms of nature to these essential shapes. By the time of his death in 1906, Picasso and Braque were in the midst of exploring the most radical implications of his style."

Cezanne. Blue Landscape. 1904-06"He sometimes worked on the same picture for years, never satisfied with the results. He seldom signed his works, because he never considered them finished. Those he did sign had his mark of approval. During the last decade of his life, Cézanne's paintings became more simplified, the objects in his landscapes reduced to components -- cylinders, cones and spheres. He is often seen as anticipating cubist and abstract art, because he reduced the imperfect forms of nature to these essential shapes. By the time of his death in 1906, Picasso and Braque were in the midst of exploring the most radical implications of his style."

Feeling out of place in Paris, he left after a relatively short period and returned to his home in Aix-en-Provence. He would remain in his native Provence for most of the rest of his life. He worked in the semi-isolation afforded by the country, but was never really out of touch with the breakthroughs of the avant-garde.Like the Impressionists, he often worked outdoors directly before his subjects. But unlike the Impressionists, Cézanne used color, not as an end in itself, but rather like line, as a tool with which to construct form. Ironically, it is the Parisian avant-garde that would eventually seek him out.

Cezanne. Basket of Apples. 1893."So why would Cézanne turn so often to this discredited subject? Actually, it was the very fact that still life was so neglected that seems to have attracted Cézanne to it. So outmoded was the iconography (symbolic forms and references) in still life that this rather hopeless subject was freed of virtually all convention. Here was a subject that offered extraordinary freedom, a blank slate that gave Cézanne the opportunity to invent meaning unfettered by tradition. By the way, Cézanne would almost single-handedly revive the subject of still life and he made it an important subject for Picasso, Matisse, and others in the 20th century.  The image above looks simple enough, a wine bottle, a basket of fruit tipped up to expose a bounty of fruit inside, a plate of what are perhaps stacked cookies or rolls, and a tablecloth both gathered and draped. Nothing remarkable, at least not until one begins to notice the odd errors in drawing. Look, for instance, at the lines that represent the close and far edge of the table. I remember an old student of mine, in a class several years back, looking at this a shouting out, "I would never hire him as a carpenter!" What she had noticed was the odd stepping of a line that we expect to be straight. ..."

Cezanne. Basket of Apples. 1893."So why would Cézanne turn so often to this discredited subject? Actually, it was the very fact that still life was so neglected that seems to have attracted Cézanne to it. So outmoded was the iconography (symbolic forms and references) in still life that this rather hopeless subject was freed of virtually all convention. Here was a subject that offered extraordinary freedom, a blank slate that gave Cézanne the opportunity to invent meaning unfettered by tradition. By the way, Cézanne would almost single-handedly revive the subject of still life and he made it an important subject for Picasso, Matisse, and others in the 20th century. The image above looks simple enough, a wine bottle, a basket of fruit tipped up to expose a bounty of fruit inside, a plate of what are perhaps stacked cookies or rolls, and a tablecloth both gathered and draped. Nothing remarkable, at least not until one begins to notice the odd errors in drawing. Look, for instance, at the lines that represent the close and far edge of the table. I remember an old student of mine, in a class several years back, looking at this a shouting out, "I would never hire him as a carpenter!" What she had noticed was the odd stepping of a line that we expect to be straight. ..."

Another theme that came to fascinate Cezanne for the rest of his career was the still life. The same will to make “out of impressionism something solid and durable” presides over these immensely powerful, exquisitely balanced compositions.  He managed in fact, to impart some of the calm monumetality of his paintings of Mont Sainte-Victoire to the apparently more simple shapes of apples and oranges.

The process was complex. A young admirer, Louis Le Bail, described how “Cézanne arranged the fruits , contrating the tones one against the other, making the complementaries vibrate, the greens against the reds, the yellows against the blues, tipping, turning, balancing the fruits as he wanted them to be, using coins of one or two sous for the purpose.” And from Emile Bernard, we know that he started with the shadow, with one dab, which he covered with another large one, and then with a third, until together they formed a screen that modeled the object in color.”

Mont Sainte-Victoire. "Therefore, one might imagine that the impressionists in their own way, and in stark contrast to fragmentary science, echoed the views of Husserl in philosophy and culture, and Wittgenstein in linguistic philosophy—that the world is not composed of things, but that all aspects of a broader canvas are interconnected and that this interconnectedness dominates any fertile real thinking about man and the world, not seeing things as separate parts of a mechanical toy, as reductionist science would certainly have us believe."

Mont Sainte-Victoire. "Therefore, one might imagine that the impressionists in their own way, and in stark contrast to fragmentary science, echoed the views of Husserl in philosophy and culture, and Wittgenstein in linguistic philosophy—that the world is not composed of things, but that all aspects of a broader canvas are interconnected and that this interconnectedness dominates any fertile real thinking about man and the world, not seeing things as separate parts of a mechanical toy, as reductionist science would certainly have us believe."

In 1899, two years after the death of Cezanne’s mother, the family estate, Jas de Bouffan, was sold. Henceforth the painter was to live in Aix itself, spending the mornings in his studio  and leaving the city early in the afternoon to go out into the countryside and paint his favorite motifs. While he sank into obscurity in his home town, however, his work began at last to attract some favorable attention in Paris, where a handful of enthusiasts; including Van Gogh, Gauguin, Signac, and Seurat; gathered in the shop of Julien Tanguay, the paint merchant, to see the latest work Cézanne had sent from Aix.

Turning Road at Montgerault."Even as we see the three zones of space in relation to each other, the painting seems oddly flat, as if the sky were pulled forward and the foreground were pushed back. Of course we still see the illusion, but even as we see the space that Cézanne's line insists upon, the painting looks too much like three flat planes resting atop each other and the painting begins to remind us that it is, in fact, a vertical curtain.   There are two means by which Cézanne has sabotaged the space of this canvas (unfortunately the effect is muted in reproduction and even more so on the computer screen--so trust me on this). The first is brushwork. In an Old Master landscape, the greatest detail and the most delicate brushwork exist in the foreground. The movements of the brush get broader and more generalized as space moves back. Here, however, the artist has treated the entire canvas with a consistent level of clarity, or lack there of, leveling the sense of near and far.   Secondly, Cézanne has understood the potential of color, as opposed to chiaroscuro and linear perspective to structure or destablize space. Have you noticed that in the middle of the sky, just to the left of the church steeple and the tree, there is a small smudge of brown paint. It is the same ocher used to render the shadows in the road and on the roofs. What is this?! Have you ever seen a dense brown smudge just floating in the sky? "

Turning Road at Montgerault."Even as we see the three zones of space in relation to each other, the painting seems oddly flat, as if the sky were pulled forward and the foreground were pushed back. Of course we still see the illusion, but even as we see the space that Cézanne's line insists upon, the painting looks too much like three flat planes resting atop each other and the painting begins to remind us that it is, in fact, a vertical curtain. There are two means by which Cézanne has sabotaged the space of this canvas (unfortunately the effect is muted in reproduction and even more so on the computer screen--so trust me on this). The first is brushwork. In an Old Master landscape, the greatest detail and the most delicate brushwork exist in the foreground. The movements of the brush get broader and more generalized as space moves back. Here, however, the artist has treated the entire canvas with a consistent level of clarity, or lack there of, leveling the sense of near and far. Secondly, Cézanne has understood the potential of color, as opposed to chiaroscuro and linear perspective to structure or destablize space. Have you noticed that in the middle of the sky, just to the left of the church steeple and the tree, there is a small smudge of brown paint. It is the same ocher used to render the shadows in the road and on the roofs. What is this?! Have you ever seen a dense brown smudge just floating in the sky? "

Meanwhile, two Cezanne’s had been accepted,after much official protest, by the museum in Luxembourg as part of the collector Gustave Caillebotte,s bequest. Better still, a young Creole dealer, Ambroise Vollard, persuaded Cézanne to agree to a paris exhibition of no less than 150 canvases. The usual critical gibber ensued, but Cézanne’s achievement was not lost on more percipient visitors. Pissarro, for instance, wrote to his son Lucien about “still lifes, very beautiful landscapes, very strange bathers of extraordinary tranquility,” adding that Cézanne was “a first class painter of astonishing subtlety, truth and classicism.”

In the figure paintings and landscapes of Cézanne’s last years, tonal and compositional unity predominate over any ideas of “faithfulness” to accepted standards of realism. Thus, a basic image of western art, the female nude, is considered in Cézanne’s paintings of bathers as an element of pure form rather than a realistic representation of the body. ̶

old invalid poses for all these women,” Cézanne himself told a German collector.

With the paintings of Cézanne’s maturity, the revolution of twentieth century art was already well on its way. In making the human figure conceivable as an abstraction, in giving an apple the metaphorical significance of the sun, and in helping to abolish the tyranny of linear perspective, Cézanne opened the doors for all kinds of experiments. Thus, the stubborn hermit of Aix turned out to be the new generation’s greatest inspiration; “the father of us all,” as Matisse said. When he died in 1906 at the age of sixty-seven, the fauve movement was already gathering momentum. With their emphasis on the primacy of color, they, and to a lesser extent the expressionists,evolved and intensified one aspect of Cezanne’s achievement. Similarly, the cubists adopted the master’s approach to form and arrived at a new conclusion in which three dimensional reality was conveyed by combining several different viewpoints within the same image.

Still Life With a Curtain. 1895. "Most of his pictures are still lifes. These were done in the studio, with simple props; a cloth, some apples, a vase or bowl and, later in his career, plaster sculptures. Cézanne's still lifes are both traditional and modern. The fruits and objects are readily identifiable, but they have no aroma, no sensual or tactile appeal and no other function other than as passive decorative objects coexisting in the same flat space. They bear no relation to the colorful vegetables of Provence -- gorgeous red tomatoes, purple aubergines, and bright green courgettes. In his pursuit of the essence of art, Cézanne had to suppress earthly delights."

Still Life With a Curtain. 1895. "Most of his pictures are still lifes. These were done in the studio, with simple props; a cloth, some apples, a vase or bowl and, later in his career, plaster sculptures. Cézanne's still lifes are both traditional and modern. The fruits and objects are readily identifiable, but they have no aroma, no sensual or tactile appeal and no other function other than as passive decorative objects coexisting in the same flat space. They bear no relation to the colorful vegetables of Provence -- gorgeous red tomatoes, purple aubergines, and bright green courgettes. In his pursuit of the essence of art, Cézanne had to suppress earthly delights."

Born into a dying tradition that enshrined narrative effectiveness as its supreme value, Cézanne helped to set painting on a course that ended in complete non-representation, the furthest remove imaginable from the nineteenth-century Salon. Within a decade or so of his death, the ultimate point in abstraction: Kasimir Malevich’s “Suprematist Composition- White on White”, a white square on a white ground, was reached.

The revolution thus accomplished was as total as it was brief, with the result that virtually every kind of present-day art refers back to it. Even Cézanne, in his most boastful moments, would have been astounded by the rapidity and breadth of his influence. And with good reason. His work has become more than famous, both in itself and as a reinvention of the vocabulary of painting.

Still Life With Apples and Oranges. 1895-1900.

Still Life With Apples and Oranges. 1895-1900.

“Producing a mosaic of coloured shapes is a closer approximation to genuine artistic activity and the product—a patchwork of shapes and colours—is a closer approximation to the visual world around us—for objects are not crisply delineated ‘things,’ but are merely elements within a wider fabric that is the landscape.

These ideas can be seen quite clearly in the works of Corot, Sisley, Pissarro, Monet, Boudin and Gaugin, and even to some degree in Turner, Chardin and Constable and it is a technique and attitude that was then progressed much further by Cezanne, then by Picasso and Matisse….

Rather than the tradition of drawing outlines of ‘things,’ and colouring them in, they acted upon the view they held and painted blobs of colour they could see and hence an impression of the landscape was created rather than hard-edged outlines of ‘things’ that make up the view. This radical new approach is clearly visible in Monet, Sisley, Corot, Seurat and most other true impressionists. It is therefore just as much an idea, a way of seeing, as it is a technique.

This radical departure from tradition is so subtle and yet so absolute in its view of the visual world around us. It basically refuses to accept that the world is composed of ‘things’ each to be separately delineated, but rather, it holds that there is just one extensive ‘colour continuum’ that is interrupted in places here and there by discontinuities where the different ‘forms’ appear in it.” ( Peter Morrell )

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2 Responses to CÉZANNE:ABOLISHING THE TYRANNY OF LINEAR PERSPECTIVE…. FOREVER

  1. Erik says:

    I think the tyranny now belongs quite solidly on the other side of the court these days. Art students are being taught subjective material only, and have little or no idea how to draw realistically or like Cezanne, or like anything.

    They are being robbed of a collective history of education that only recognizes modernism as a true liberation. All break throughs were in the spirit of modernism in their own time. Let’s actually teach students how to think visually through composition, drawing, design and color mixing, to give them the same ammunition that artists of the past had. Quality. Erik

    • Dave says:

      thanks for the comment; one very much in the spirit of what an expert like Donald Kuspit has been writing about. I agree. Best. Dave

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