Lime green, dark green, emerald green, grass green. Paul Cezanne colour ranges are incredibly rich in tones. The French painter applied the nuanced colours next to and on top of each other, using short, decisive brush strokes. Seen from close up they look like an abstract carpet of densely interwoven colours. But if you take a step back, slender pines push their upper branches far above the stony ochre coloured mountain slope in front of the blue of the distant sea. On the left, the houses of the fishing village of l’Estaque nestle together like building blocks.

Things that last

In the bay of Marseille Cezanne found exactly what he needed for his unique way of working. A natural environment that didn’t experience much change. That’s why he particularly appreciated the Mediterranean vegetation, which remains green all year round. Unlike the Impressionists, Cezanne did not seek to capture the fleeting. On the contrary, he wanted to express the strength and durability of nature in his paintings. In addition, he took what he saw in front of him and reconstructed it in the picture; as a structure of colour values and facets of form in its own right. For many later modern artists, this vision and approach was to be ground-breaking.