View of Gardanne 1886

Paul Cézanne's 'View of Gardanne', now at the Brooklyn Museum, captures a hilltop village in the South of France with oil on canvas. Cézanne, working in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, was at the epicenter of debates around what constituted modern art and what role painting should play in it. During this period, artists grappled with representing the world authentically amidst rapid industrialization and urbanization. Cézanne distanced himself from traditional academic styles in favor of subjective perception and the emotional depth of lived experience. You see this in the brushstrokes, which create structure but also convey his feelings about the town. Cézanne once said he wanted "to show nature as it is, but within the context of painting." In 'View of Gardanne', the village isn’t just a landscape; it's a dense accumulation of human existence nestled into the natural world, rendered with a deep, personal touch. It offers an enduring reflection on place, memory, and the subjective nature of seeing.