Paul Cézanne

Paul Cézanne (son of the artist), Paris
Bernheim-Jeune, Paris
Leopold Badt, Munich
Ambroise Vollard, Paris
Etienne Bignou, New York
Stanley N. Barbee, Beverly Hills (acquired at the above sale and sold: Parke-Bernet Galleries, New York, Barbee Collection, April 20, 1944, lot 10)
Sale: Sotheby's, New York, May 9, 2001, lot 338
Acquired at the above sale by the present owner

Paris, Galerie Bernheim-Jeune; Berlin, Galerie Paul Cassirer, Les Aquarelles de Cézanne, 1907, no. 54 (Paris) and no. 48 (Berlin)
Paris, Galerie Bernheim-Jeune, Aquarelles et Pastels, 1909, no. 15
New York, Photo-Secession, Watercolors by Cézanne, 1911, no. 13

Ambroise Vollard, Photo Archives of Cézanne Watercolors, no. 143
Lionello Venturi, Paul Cézanne, son Art, son Oeuvre, Paris, 1936, no. 999, illustrated p. 298
John Rewald, Paul Cézanne, The Watercolors, Boston, 1983, no. 326, illustrated

The sheet has a weak light stain. There have been repairs of a number of small edge tears at the left and right edges done in a professional manner. There is also a small paper fill at the upper right edge. At the bottom edge near the right corner is a small tear and a small skinned area. The pigments, while perhaps a bit light struck (as should be expected), are in fine condition. There are a few weak foxing spots. The bottom edge at the left has had a hard crease ironed out as well as possible. The following condition report has been provided by Alan Firkser of Paper Conservation Studio, Inc., an independent restorer who is not an employee of Sotheby's.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

Rewald writes that in his watercolors from the late 1880s, Cézanne "strove to establish a balance between his masterful, economic yet eloquent drawing and the equally economic yet deft use of luminous spots of colors [...] They represent, if not a radical departure from the conventional concept of the role of white paper in watercolors, at least a type of harmony to which the whiteness of the support is essential. Its all-embracing emptiness intensifies the mysterious relationship between a few firm lines and a few color accents" (John Rewald, op. cit, p. 28). This relationship between the tone of the paper, the structural lines of the landscape and the soft spots of color that both emphasize the structure (as in the brown and blue branches at center) and slide across structure (as in the green patches in the foreground) suggests Cézanne's depiction of the world taking shape as he sees it. Cézanne does not depict a fully-formed world, in other words, but one that takes form through his perception. Maurice Merleau-Ponty wrote that Cézanne "did not want to separate the stable things which we see and the shifting way in which they appear; he wanted to depict matter as it takes on form, the birth of order through spontaneous organization" (Merleau-Ponty, "Cézanne's Doubt", Sense and Non-Sense, Evanston, 1964, p. 13). The present work shows Cézanne's presentation of the play between color and line as they move together to bring architectural shape from the surface of the paper.