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Peaches and pears

Paul Cezanne • Painting, 1895, 61×90 cm
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About the artwork
Art form: Painting
Subject and objects: Still life
Style of art: Post-Impressionism
Technique: Oil
Materials: Canvas
Date of creation: 1895
Size: 61×90 cm
Artwork in selections: 36 selections
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Description of the artwork «Peaches and pears»

Peaches and pears are almost as beautiful as apples. They don't move. And if it doesn't really matter what to paint - the door or the human head - it is always better to paint apples or peaches. Cézanne created more than 200 still lifes with vases, clocks, skulls, plaster cupids, flowers, tureens, sugar bowls and jugs. And almost always with fruits. Gauguin, for example, said that he painted still lifes when he was tired. Edouard Manet began to create small paintings with fruits and flowers by the end of life, when he was ill and wasn't able to cope with large canvases. Cézanne rediscovered the still life.

"Grappling directly with objects. They buoy us up. A sugar bowl teaches us as much about ourselves and our art as a Chardin or a Monticelli. People think a sugar bowl has no physiognomy, no soul. But that changes every day, too. You have to know how to take them, coax them, those little fellows." - this Cézanne's phrase became very popular. And "coaxing a sugar bowl" can be considered an allegory if it's said by anyone but him. He seriously looks for the apple's soul and the jug's character. Almost every artist, who came after Cézanne to create contemporary art, said: the color in Cézanne's paintings is not an external designation, it comes from within an object in an incomprehensible way.

Before starting to paint a still life, Cézanne spent a long time placing objects on the table. When he made his still life arrangements, he would put one sou coins under the fruit, so that it would look just as he intended. He made monumental, similar to the mountain ridge, folds on the tablecloth. Every object intended for still life, was right for Cézanne. At some point in the discussion, critics suddenly realized that the artist did not stand in one place while painting. He walked away from the canvas, coaxing a fragile sugar bowl, a strong apple or a supple, dull peach. The objects are written from different points of view since Cézanne had his own approach for each of them.

The background in his paintings almost always rises, stretching and deepening the middle ground. The space is stretched, allowing to see everything what would be seen if we could go around the table with Cézanne. He does not mind - he lets us peek into the jug and see whether the hanger is stable on the floor.
Being separately under the constant threat of falling into the abyss of the foreground, these peaches remain in place for an eternity, giving in to Cezanne's magical ability to balance the tilted composition.

Author: Anna Sidelnikova
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