Climbing the hill, walking past the studio of Cezanne and on to the Chemin de la Marguerite, I continued walking until I reach la colline de le Jardin de les Lauves – The Garden on the Hill at Les Lauves. Finally reaching the entrance to the park, I realized that my climb was not yet finished. A dirt path and some steps carved out of the ground led me through what I thought at first was only an empty lot between two houses. But finally, I reached the summit. I took a place to rest on the stone wall that forms a large arc around the top of the garden. It was late afternoon and the sun had already left the area where I sat. But the Sainte-Victoire, the lone jagged rock of a mountain jutting up from the landscape across the valley, was lit up by the spotlight of the setting sun.

It was here that Cezanne repeatedly set up his easel, en pleine-aire, during the years of 1902 and 1906 to complete 11 oil paintings and 17 watercolors of that lone mountain. Paintings that capture the life and the spirit of this everchanging landscape. I took a few photographs although it was much easier to just sit here and watch the light change on the mountain. The bright light and grey stone of Saint-Victoire slowly change to waning light and blue stone, then on to the rose of the setting sun. I could see why this mountain fascinated him. It’s a fascinating thing, a fascinating landscape.

Painting: Mont Saint-Victoire 1904-05

ATELIER PAUL CEZANNE
9, avenue Paul Cézanne
13090 AIX EN PROVENCE
T: +33 (0)4 42 21 06 53

The country near Aix where Cezanne works is the same as this (near Arles). It is still the Crau. If coming home with my own canvas I say to myself, ‘Look! I’ve got the very same tones of old Cezanne!’ I only mean that Cezanne is so absolutely part of the countryside, and he knows it so intimately, that you must make the same calculations in your head to arrive at the same tones.Of course if you saw them side by side they would go together, but there would be no resemblance. — Van Gogh on comparing the landscape around his Arles with Cezanne’s Aix, from Dear Theo

From French to English

Aix: Short for Aix-en-Provence, the name of the town where Cezanne lived most of his life. Pronounced like a cross between ‘Ex’ and ‘Axe’.

en-Provence: in the region of Provence. Provence is a region that includes the departments of Alpes de Haute Provence, Bouches du Rhone and the Vaucluse.

atelier: studio

avenue Paul Cezanne: avenue has the same meaning as the word in English, a wide street, and all over France there are streets named after famous French people, including artists, writers and musicians.

Le Jardin de les Lauves: The Garden at the top of the Hill. Cezanne painted many landscape paintings of Mont Saint-Victoire from this vantage point. There is a nice display of these landscapes in the garden, that you can compare to the real thing. To get there from the studio, just keep walking up the hill to the top. The studio is about halfway up the hill to the garden.

pleine aire: to paint out of doors in and from nature

le motif: a term used by Cezanne to describe painting from the source, from and in nature.

Learn more about the Crau, the area mentioned in Van Gogh’s quote.

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