French la Vie

 

 

 

Mount Saint Victoire

photo by Corey

 

 

 

On top of the Provencal world.

Sacha, Fabrice and Shelby hiked up Mount Sainte-Victoire,

 

 

 

 

 

Fabrice is a childhood friend, and Shelby is Mari’s daughter. The first time Mari met Sacha she told him, “You are going to marry my daughter.”

 

 

 

 

Somewhere out there is Saint Zacharie our town, and Cassis.

 

 

“Where did the artist stand to paint this painting? Cézanne painted Sainte-Victoire mountain near his home in Provence more than sixty times in one decade. Because Cézanne enjoyed painting geometric forms, this mountain was a perfect muse. In this painting the mountain is composed of different shades of gray. The horizontal and parallel brushstrokes show the texture of the landscape.

Cézanne painted during the 1800s, around the time that the automobile, airplane, camera, and telephone were invented. As you can imagine, these inventions had a dramatic impact on daily life. Some people enjoyed the comfort and efficiency that modernity brought while Cezanne fled the new, fast-paced, materialistic life style. Cézanne preferred to live in the south of France, where the pace of life was slower.

Before touching brush to canvas, Cézanne carefully considered his subject. Whether a mountain or an apple, Cezanne focused on the colors and shapes that he saw. Serusier once wrote about Cézanne’s painting technique, “He cleaned away from pictorial art all the mold that time had deposited upon it; he restored all that was sound, pure, and classic.”¹ Cézanne was admired for using patches of color to create form.”

_{¹Murphy, Richard W. The World of Cézanne 1839–1906. (Alexandria, Virginia: Time Life Library of Art, 1968), 9}

 

 

 

 

947 meters high

 

“Cézanne was my one and only master (…) He was like the father of us all”
Pablo Picasso

The many views of the Montagne Sainte-Victoire that Paul Cézanne painted between 1882 and 1906 rank among the greatest landscapes ever painted, and they had a great importance in the development of modern art

Cézanne moved to Provence in the early 1880’s and, disillusioned with Impressionism, he decided to follow his own path, finding inspiration in the landscape. His soon became interested in the representation of Mount Sainte-Victoire, a 1011 meter (3,317 ft) high near Aix-en-Provence.

Like Hokusai in his “Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji”, Cézanne used different points of view in his “Montagne Sainte-Victoire” paintings, allowing the representation of the environs of the mountain. This diversity is key to understanding the evolution of Cezanne’s late style. In the first views of the mountain, of which the most famous example is exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum of New York (1882-1885), Cézanne gives importance to the drawing, highlighting the presence of the trees in the foreground. In the later works, like the ones belonging to the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Kunsthaus Zurich, line has virtually disappeared and there are only colour planes representing different volumes.

“Treat nature by means of the cylinder, the sphere, the cone, everything brought into proper perspective”, Cézanne wrote in 1904. The art of Cézanne, “cubist before the cubism”, set the basis of the 20th century avant-garde.” Via Artwolf

 

 

 

 

 

A while ago, last July, another hike was taken with Fabrice, Sacha, French Husband, Chelsea…

 

I suppose it is an annual adventure hike.

 

 

 

 

 

“Paul Cézanne (1839-1906) was the son of a rich banker and landowner in Aix-en-Provence, in the south of France.

Cézanne’s father originally hoped that his son would pursue a legal career, but eventually agreed to support him financially as an artist.

In 1861, Cézanne travelled to Paris on the advice of his schoolmate, the writer Émile Zola, and exhibited for some years with Impressionist artists such as Camille Pissarro.

However, he ultimately preferred to work in his native Aix and spent much of his career back at the family farm, the Jas de Bouffan, where his father gave him a studio space.

Cézanne learnt much from Impressionism but whilst many of his contemporaries were focusing on city life, Cézanne chose to depict the landscapes and peasant inhabitants around his home town.” Via the Courtauld

 

 

 

 

While the gang was hiking up the majestic Saint Victoire, Mari and I were hitting the brocantes with the aim to fill her container. 

Where would you rather be?

Hiking

or

Brocanting?

 

 

 

 

Did Cezanne ever make it to the top?

 

 

 

 

Being on the top.

Living Art.

A painter, hiker, explorer, dreamer..

Being in the middle of it all.

Absorbing beauty.

 

 

 

 

An artist paints a painting and it goes around the world inspiring others.

Two children meet because their mothers met on the internet due to their shared passion for France and design.

Saint Victoire.

…

All the photos above are from Sacha and Fabrice.

 

 

 

 

Driving by, leaning out the window, catching the glory of this incredible mountain.