Brand New!! Review - Cezanne Portraits At The National Portrait Gallery

I recommend you lot meet the novel Cezanne Portraits exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery if you lot can.  I wasn't expecting to similar it equally much as  I did. 

It's really much a historic one-off exhibition. It's the really initiative of all time

• over l of his portraits get got been gathered together for exhibition inwards i place. 
• his portraits get got been seriously exhibited since he died as well as the retrospective inwards the Paris Salon d’Automne of 1907, the yr after his decease which influenced both Henri Matisse as well as Pablo Picasso, alongside others.

It's also a splendid as well as pregnant exhibition occupying almost all of the Blue Planet flooring exhibition infinite at the National Portrait Gallery - the same infinite occupied past times the exhibitions for the Lucian Freud retrospective as well as Picasso's Portraits.

Interestingly, it opens inwards London 111 years - almost to the twenty-four hours - after he died inwards 1906.

The lastly self-portrait (1898-1900) past times Cezanne
fossil oil on canvas, 641mm x 533mm
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

The exhibition opened to the public at the NPG  today as well as continues until eleven Feb 2018. So lots of fourth dimension to meet it - nonetheless this i is undoubtedly going to live a blockbuster (see below) - so don't hang around to mass tickets.

• It's come upwardly from Paris (Musée d'Orsay 13 June - 24 September 2017) 
• When it leaves London it goes to the National Art Gallery inwards Washington - West Building, Main Floor, March 25 – July 1, 2018

I saw it twice yesterday - inwards the morning time at the PV as well as and so i time again inwards the afternoon at the Friends Preview - which was packed.

The Portraits include 2 of (left) his gallerist Vollard as well as (right) the fine art critic Geffroy

The morning time was a briefing. I listened to Nicholas Cullinan tell how this exhibition started out some 6 years agone during the tenure of his predecessor Sandy Nairne.

Then listened to the curator of the exhibition, John Elderfield, provided an fantabulous tour as well as explanation of the exhibition. (He's the Chief Curator Emeritus of Painting as well as Sculpture at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, next his tenure from 2003 to 2008. He's also now the Adler Distinguished Curator of European Art as well as Lecturer 19th- as well as 20th-Century European Art at Princeton).  

RECOMMENDED READ: John Elderfield has written an article for Apollo Magazine - Cézanne’s radical portraiture by John Elderfield

He also highlighted the assist that the online Cezanne catalogue raisonnée published inwards 2014 had been inwards preparing the exhibition (and incidentally it's fascinating!)

Elderfield's aim has been to:

• give a feel of progression inwards Cezanne's epitome processes from kickoff to end. 
• models at the kickoff are largely family, lovers as well as really unopen friends. Towards the halt of his life he paints people around where he lives inwards Provence. His married adult woman as well as boy past times this phase are living inwards Paris.
• his purpose of the knife seems to diminish after the criticisms at the Salon inwards 1876
• his palette changes as well as lightens after 1872 when he moves to Auvers to live nigh Pissaro as well as acquire well-nigh epitome plein air as well as how to pigment landscapes
• his portrait production drops - earlier recovering afterwards inwards life
• highlight the complementary pairs of paintings as well as the serial of paintings - dissimilar versions of the same subject (eg of himself, his married adult woman Hortense, his uncle - but also of his gardener at the halt of his life)

Three paintings of Hortense inwards a ruby-red dress

• plus highlight the continuities e.g. 
• Cezanne's intense dislike of the poetic or cute 
• the fact he didn't desire smiles, gestures or whatever travail past times his sitters!
• the omission of whatever commissions - quite deliberately
• the lack of portraits of of import people - he stuck to job solid unit of measurement as well as friends. In this exhibition only 2 people are "known" exterior his job solid unit of measurement as well as friends as well as the ordinary people where he lived.
• he liked to pigment genuine ordinary people who didn't require to live flattered
• his aim was to pigment the factual faces of ordinary people - their personality was non something he took into account.
• he never exhibited betwixt 1876 - when the Salon derided his locomote as well as 1895 when his dealer Vollard created an exhibition of his paintings

Elderfield called him "the most profound portraitist since Rembrandt"

Nicholas Cullinan, Director of the National Portrait Gallery with John Elderfield, the Curator of the Exhibition

Judging past times the number of people inwards the exhibition yesterday afternoon, it's prophylactic to tell this is going to live a really pop as well as potentially crowded exhibition. 

The NPG are endeavouring to keep sensible numbers past times having a timed entry - as well as when you lot mass your ticket you'll require to position a curt window when you lot volition acquire inwards to enter.

Advance booking is highly recommended for this exhibition (NPG website)

The way the exhibition is hung way that artworks are nicely spaced out. Based on yesterday when it was crowded, it should live perfectly possible to meet each i comfortably. So you lot pass fourth dimension looking as well as non inwards trying to locomote out how to acquire to meet the side past times side one!

Why this is a particular exhibition

Two self-portraits c.1875

• It brings together some l of Cezanne's portraits for the really initiative of all time.  These stand upwardly for well-nigh a quarter of the 200 portraits Cézanne is known to get got painted inwards his career. 
• He painted 26 self-portraits as well as 29 portraits of his married adult woman as well as a pregnant number of them are inwards this exhibition

Two paintings of Madame Cezanne inwards bluish 1886-7
painted around the fourth dimension they married as well as some xiv years after the nativity of their boy Paul

• It includes his initiative of all as well as his lastly self-portrait
• It includes paintings of his boy equally a minor child.
• It's the initiative of all exhibition dedicated to his portraits since the i organised past times dealer Ambroise Vollard inwards 1910 which showed 24 ‘Figures de Cézanne’. 

“Up until now, Cézanne’s portraiture has received surprisingly piddling attention, so nosotros are thrilled to live able to choose together so many of his portraits for the initiative of all fourth dimension to let on arguably the most personal, as well as thus most human, aspect of Cézanne’s art.” Nicholas Cullinan

• it has 3 of the leading museums inwards the globe participating - as well as plant get got come upwardly from a number of prestigious museums as well as individual collections worldwide
• It volition get got a cinema well-nigh it released inwards Jan 2018.

It includes a number of famous paintings including this i of his wife. It's i of the earliest paintings of Hortense Fiquet (1850-1922) who was his lover earlier she finally became Madame Cezanne. He painted 27 portraits of her.

Madame Cézanne inwards a Red Armchair (c. 1877)
fossil oil on canvass 725mm x 360mm
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

I liked the handling of the cloth inwards the skirt.

The skirt inwards the 

It also includes a number of paintings which get got never been seen earlier - including:

• Two self-portraits of Cezanne inwards a bowler lid get got never been on display inwards the U.K. before

John Elderfield existence interviewed inwards front end of the 2 self-portraits of Cezanne inwards a bowler hat

• a serial of paintings of his uncle - made using a palette knife non long after he started to pigment portraits - which were reviled past times the Salon when exhibited. Critics made it really clear they did non similar his knife paintings

Paintings of his uncle made using a knife

What struck me the most was how similar Cezanne was to another dandy portrait painters - similar Lucian Freud - who typically painted family, friends as well as his studio assistant as well as dealers - as well as accepted really few commissions. (Hockney ditto - although I'm non certain I'd telephone band him a dandy portrait painter!)

It's equally if epitome people is well-nigh epitome the things inwards your life at the same fourth dimension equally you lot locomote through procedure issues as well as things you lot desire to experiment with.

This exhibition is no revelation inwards damage of personality of the sitters - but it tells us a lot well-nigh Cezanne, his life, his epitome as well as his personal preferences - as well as lack of fourth dimension for as well as involvement inwards epitome emotions or anything sentimental.

That said the paintings of his boy are quite beautiful.

The Artist's boy (Paul Cezanne) 1881-2
fossil oil on canvass 350mm x 380mm
Musee de l'Orangerie, Paris

In the afternoon, came the realisation that many of the paintings are ones which could live hung inwards a contemporary portrait exhibition today - as well as nobody would know they were done over 100 years ago!

The paintings aspect amazingly fresh.

For me it emphasised but how much Cezanne has influenced modern as well as contemporary epitome - as well as why this exhibition is a MUST SEE for all contemporary portrait painters

My only gripe is that I recollect the NPG could get got done a lot to a greater extent than on the website to explicate the exhibition. It deserves a proper microsite rather than i which is almost alone commercially orientated. I don't heed commercial aspects - but NOT at the expense of the educational for those who can't acquire to the exhibition!

I also recommend the minor booklet called Painting People.

Photograph of Cezanne inwards former age

Reviews of the Exhibition

You tin strength out also read the other reviews of the exhibition.....

• The Telegraph | Cézanne Portraits: Alastair Sooke goes behind the scenes of the National Gallery's landmark exhibition
• The Guardian - awarded it 5 STARS | Cézanne Portraits review – clay pipes as well as rustling skirts captured past times a questioning genius | Adrian Searle
• The Spectator | Cezanne Portraits exhibition inwards Paris, London as well as Washington (December 2016)