Chestnut trees and farm at Jas de Bouffan FWN 90 1876 51cm x 65
Chestnut tree and farm at the Jas du Bouffan FWN 202 1885/6 65.5cm x 81.3
We’re coming to the end of the blogs relating to Cezanne’s second phase of development – his Impressionist phase, of the 1870’s; and so I thought I’d spend some time in a few different blogs having a look at paintings with similar motifs from the second, third and final phase. (Impressionist, constructivist and mature phases respectively.) Here’s two of the same motif, but ten years apart. Cezanne didn’t paint any of the Jas de Bouffan in his mature phase, and in later blogs, we’ll begin to find out why. (Cezanne’s father received the Jas de Bouffan, a dilapidated manor house, farm buildings and vineyards, in 1859 as payment to settle a debt; and the family lived there for nigh on 40 years. Cezanne was happy to have his own room on the ground floor where he could keep all his paintings and equipment, and hide away, and very happy because of all the different motifs it provided him easy access to)
I love both these paintings – they both make me smile, individually; and yes – for different reasons. The pastoral colours of the 1876 one are what I first fell in love with in Cezanne’s oeuvre: I could just sit and stare, in their gentleness and stillness; the painting soothes my soul, as I remember the beauty of days enjoyed in the sun: it makes me smile. From Cezanne’s Impressionist phase, the 1876 one is a painting that delights me: the colours delight me but also I delight in seeing how Cezanne delights in finding new ways to paint delightfully. I love finding out how Cezanne brings his painting together: one trick is to repeat a colour in a series – so, the colour of the building in the centre of the painting is repeated at far left behind the wall of chestnut trees, and again in between the wall and single chestnut tree; and then on the right, behind the small tree, and at far right edge on the horizon. Unconsciously, we feel the breadth of this warm colour across the whole painting. Again, the grey-white colour of the garden wall to the right stretching horizontally, is repeated behind the small tree, and then again in a thin band of grey beyond. Unconsciously we feel the depth of this grey, leading our eye to the rolling green hill beyond. The immanency of the chestnut trees seek our attention first – the single tree and its rather agitated foliage, and the peculiar single wall of chestnut trucks; but they give way to the transcendent stillness of the farm buildings and Provençale countryside. The red signature signs its realization just as happily as hands brought together with interlocking fingers. There is something deeply delightful in our capacity to express ourselves joyfully.
Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile,
but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy.
Sometimes my joy can be the source of your smile
and sometimes your joy can be the source of my smile:
delightful.
enlarged, from Thich Nhat Hanh’ sometimes
The 1886 one is an invitation to partake of the vibrancy of life, from Cezanne’s constructivist phase. It is as if we are sitting amongst the chestnut trees; such is the intensity of the sharply defined darkness of tree trunks, and the full bright warmth of the sunlight shining through. 1885 was a year of turmoil for Cezanne; and sometimes, when things get so bad, you either go under or shake yourself down and ‘still I rise’. Cezanne managed the latter: 1886 was thereafter a turning point in Cezanne’s personal life: he realised that his relationship with Zola would develop no further; he acknowledged the truth of his fear of his father, just before his father passed away; and he publicly acknowledged his relationship with Hortense, and they married. He came to terms with all his deepest hidden fears, and grew into a man. It’s as if he’s sitting under the chestnut trees reading this poem:
I go among trees and sit still.
All my stirring becomes quiet
around me like circles on water.
My tasks lie in their places
where I left them, asleep like cattle.
Then what is afraid of me comes
and lives a while in my sight.
What it fears in me leaves me,
and the fear of me leaves it.
It sings, and I hear its song.
Then what I am afraid of comes.
I live for a while in its sight.
What I fear in it leaves it,
and the fear of it leaves me.
It sings, and I hear its song.
After days of labour,
mute in my consternations,
I hear my song at last,
and I sing it. As we sing,
the day turns, the trees move.
Wendell Berry