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A man sitting in a tall, upholstered armchair reads a newspaper in this vertical portrait painting. The man and the room in which he sits is loosely painted with bold, visible strokes throughout. He holds the paper close to his face, and the top edge falls over so we can read the title, “L’EVENEMENT.” He has a light, olive-toned complexion, and his white hair peeks from under a close-fitting black cap. He wears a high-necked white shirt under a chocolate-brown jacket, steel-gray trousers, white socks, and camel-brown shoes. The fabric on the chair is painted with broad brushstrokes to create a loose floral pattern on a white background. The man and chair are outlined in black. The man sits in the corner of a room with a closed door behind him to our right. Hanging on the wall over his head, and partially obscured by it, is a small, possibly unframed, still life painting with what could be kelly-green fruit and a royal-blue cup against a black background.

The Artist's Father, Reading "L'Événement", 1866

Paul Cezanne

Not on View

This portrait reveals Cezanne’s complicated relationship with his father. The Italian immigrant built a successful hat business and started a bank in the southern French city of Aix-en-Provence. While he intended for his only son to follow in his footsteps, Cezanne had other plans.

Here, the patriarch relaxes at home in his slippers and cap, reading a Parisian newspaper. Cezanne captures his monumental presence and selfassurance. But the artist inserts himself into the work: one of his early still lifes hangs over his father’s head. It is done in the thick painting technique Cezanne learned from his rebellious idol Gustave Courbet. In fact, this portrait itself also uses such heavy slabs of paint. Cezanne may have been asserting his independence.

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In The Artist's Father Cézanne explored his emotionally charged relationship with his banker father. Tension is particularly evident in the energetic, expressive paint handling, an exaggeration of Courbet's palette knife technique. The unyielding figure of Louis-Auguste Cézanne, the newspaper he is reading, his chair, and the room are described with obtrusively thick slabs of pigment.

The Artist's Father can be interpreted as an assertion of Cézanne's independence. During the early 1860s, Cézanne rejected the legal and banking careers advocated by his father and instead studied art, a profession his father considered grossly impractical. In this calculated composition, he seated his father precariouly near the edge of the chair and tilted the perspectival slope of the floor as though trying to tip his father out of the picture, an effect heightened by the contrast between his father's heavy legs and shoes and the delicate feet of the chair supporting him. The framed painting displayed on the back wall is a still life that Cézanne painted shortly before The Artist's Father, a statement of his artistic accomplishment. The newspaper L'Evénement refers to novelist Emile Zola, the childhood friend who championed Cézanne's bid to study art in Paris and who became art critic for the paper in 1866. Cézanne's father customarily read another journal.

Object Data

Medium

oil on canvas

Dimensions

overall: 198.5 x 119.3 cm (78 1/8 x 46 15/16 in.)

framed: 224.2 x 144.8 x 10.1 cm (88 1/4 x 57 x 4 in.)

Credit Line

Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon

Accession Number

1970.5.1

Artists / Makers

Paul Cezanne (artist) French, 1839 - 1906

Image Use

This image is in the public domain.
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Detail Information

Provenance

(Ambroise Vollard [1867-1939], Paris). Auguste Pellerin [1952-1929], Paris; by inheritance to René Lecomte, Paris; Lecomte family collection; Mme. Louis de Chaisemartin, née Germaine Charlotte Lecomte; sold 1970 through (Hector Brame, Paris) to NGA.[1]

[1] Acquired with funds provided by Paul Mellon.

Associated Names

Brame, Hector
Lecomte, René
Pellerin, Auguste
Vollard, Ambroise
de Chaisemartin, Philippe, M.

Exhibition History

1882: Probably Salon of 1882, Paris, no. 520 as Portrait de M.L.A....

1936: Cezanne, Musée de l'Orangerie, Paris, 1936, no. 3

1954: Hommage a Cézanne, Musée de l'Orangerie, Paris, 1954, no. 8, repro.

1986: Gifts to the Nation: Selected Acquisitions from the Collections of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1986, unnumbered checklist

1988: Cézanne: The Early Years, Royal Academy of Arts, London; Musée d'Orsay, Paris; National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1988-1989, no. 21, repro.

1994: Origins of Impressionism, Galeries nationales d'Exposition du Grand Palais, Paris; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1994-1995, no. 26, fig. 264, repro., as Portrait de Louis-Auguste Cézanne.

1999: An Enduring Legacy: Masterpieces from the Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1999-2000, no cat.

2005: Pioneering Modern Painting: Cézanne and Pissarro 1865-1885, The Museum of Modern Art, New York; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Musée d'Orsay, Paris, 2005-2006, pl. 2, fig. 23, as The Artist's Father (shown only in New York).

2011: Impressionist and Post-Impressionist Masterpieces from the National Gallery of Art, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; The National Art Center, Tokyo; Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art, 2011, no. 8, repro.

2017: Cézanne Portraits, Musée D'Orsay, Paris; National Portrait Gallery, London; National Gallery of Art, Washington, 2017-2018, no. 4.1, repro.

Bibliography

1936: Venturi, Lionello. Cezanne, son art, son oeuvre. 2 vols. Paris, 1936.

1970: Orienti 1970, no.67.

1971: Walker, John. "The National Gallery of Art, Washington: The Founding Benefactors." The Connoisseur 178, no. 718 (December 1971): cover, title page, color repro.

1972: Hours, Madeleine. "Cézanne's Portrait of His Father." Studies in the History of Art v.4 (1971-72):63-76, repro., and note 77-80.

1972: Rewald, John. "Cézanne and His Father." Studies in the History of Art v.4 (1971-72):38-62, repro.

1975: European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 62, repro.

1978: King, Marian. Adventures in Art: National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. New York, 1978: 91, pl. 54.

1984: Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Rev. ed. New York, 1984: 500, no. 743, color repro.

1985: European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 82, repro.

1991: Gingold, Diane J., and Elizabeth A.C. Weil. The Corporate Patron. New York, 1991: 12, 98, 99, color repro.

1991: Kopper, Philip. America's National Gallery of Art: A Gift to the Nation. New York, 1991: 277, 282, repros.

1992: National Gallery of Art, Washington. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1992: 186, repro.

1996: Rewald, John. The Paintings of Paul Cézanne: a catalogue raisonné. 2 vols. New York, 1996:no. 101, repro.

1997: Kelder, Diane. The Great Book of French Impressionism, 1997, no. 360, repro.

2004: Hand, John Oliver. National Gallery of Art: Master Paintings from the Collection. Washington and New York, 2004: 388-389, no. 323, color repro.

2012: Brodie, Judith. Shock of the News. Exh. cat. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 2012:

2012: Humphries, Oscar. "Editor's Letter: Taxing Questions.' Apollo 175, no. 599 (June 2012): 23, repro.

2013: Harris, Neil. Capital Culture: J. Carter Brown, the National Gallery of Art, and the Reinvention of the Museum Experience. Chicago and London, 2013: 408-409.