Cezanne

In 1895, after eighteen years of near invisibility, the maverick fifty-six-year-old artist Paul Cezanne opened his first major solo-exhibition at the newly opened Galerie Vollard. The history of painting was never to be the same again. With an apple, I will astonish Paris, the young Cezanne had claimed before leaving his native Aix-en-Provence for the French capital, which is precisely what he did.

Cezanne's still lifes, landscapes and classical figure compositions were to give licence to generations of artists to break with the rule book of painterly conventions. However, rather than read Cezanne in hindsight, this book seeks to understand the artist in his own context: as an ambitious young painter from the provinces eager to make it in metropolitan Paris, torn between seeking official accolade and joining impressionism before relentlessly pursuing his own unique language; and as an artist who wanted to be modern while remaining deeply sceptical about the world he lived in, from political strife to a continually accelerating way of life.

With the varied perspectives of art historians, conservation scientists, and a roster of renowned contemporary artists, including Etel Adnan, Phyllida Barlow, Paul Chan, Julia Fish, Ellen Gallagher, Lubaina Himid, Kerry James Marshall, Rodney McMillian, Laura Owens and Luc Tuymans, this lavishly illustrated book highlights the artist's favourite motifs, influence on his peers, and pivotal role in the development of modern art.

It offers a fresh look at the ways in which Cezanne, driven by what he described as strong sensations, sought to develop a visual language that could fully translate his intense feelings into paintings. In doing so, he opened up possibilities that were embraced and elaborated by artists in his time and into the present.