''Mont Sainte-Victoire and the Viaduct of the Arc River Valley'' is an

oil painting Oil painting is the process of painting with pigments with a medium of drying oil as the binder. It has been the most common technique for artistic painting on wood panel or canvas for several centuries, spreading from Europe to the rest of ...

on canvas completed by the French artist

Paul Cézanne Paul Cézanne ( , , ; ; 19 January 1839 – 22 October 1906) was a French artist and Post-Impressionist painter whose work laid the foundations of the transition from the 19th-century conception of artistic endeavour to a new and radically d ...

between 1882 and 1885. It depicts Montagne Sainte-Victoire and the valley of the Arc River, with Cézanne's hometown of Aix-en-Provence in the background. Once owned by the art collectors and patrons

Henry Henry may refer to: People *Henry (given name) * Henry (surname) * Henry Lau, Canadian singer and musician who performs under the mononym Henry Royalty * Portuguese royalty ** King-Cardinal Henry, King of Portugal ** Henry, Count of Portugal, ...

and

Louisine Havemeyer Louisine Waldron Elder Havemeyer (July 28, 1855 – January 6, 1929) was an art collector, feminist, and philanthropist. In addition to being a patron of impressionist art, she was one of the more prominent contributors to the suffrage movem ...

, the painting was bequeathed to the

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

in New York after the latter's death in 1929.

Background

The ''Mont Sainte-Victoire and the Viaduct of the Arc River Valley'' was painted from 1882 to 1885, and was completed 21 years before Cézanne's artistic career finished. Cézanne began working on

Impressionism Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by relatively small, thin, yet visible brush strokes, open composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...

in his artworks in the late 19th century, nearing the end of his career, away from his post-impressionist former paintings. A later example of this can be seen in ''

The Card Players ''The Card Players'' is a series of oil paintings by the French Post-Impressionist artist Paul Cézanne. Painted during Cézanne's final period in the early 1890s, there are five paintings in the series. The versions vary in size, the number of ...

''. These mainly included still lifes and landscapes such as ''Mont Sainte-Victoire and the Viaduct of the Arc River Valley''. His aim was "to make of Impressionism something solid and durable, like the art of museums.""Paul Cézanne: Mont Sainte-Victoire and the Viaduct of the Arc River Valley (29.100.64)". In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000. Uploaded December 2008. Retrieved 30 June 2012. It was painted in the 'mature' period of Cézanne's work. The ''Mont Sainte-Victoire and the Viaduct of the Arc River Valley'' was a bequest to the Metropolitan Museum of Art by

Henry Osborne Havemeyer Henry Osborne Havemeyer (October 18, 1847 – December 4, 1907) was an American industrialist, entrepreneur and sugar refiner who founded and became president of the American Sugar Refining Company in 1891. Havemeyer was the third generation of h ...

and his wife Louisine Waldron Elder Havemeyer. After Henry died in 1907, the work passed to Louisine; it was donated to the museum following her death in 1929 as part of the Havemeyer collection of 142 artworks.Weitzenhoffer, Frances. ''The Havemeyers: Impressionism Comes to America'' (Harry N. Abrams Publishers, New York). 1986. pp. 251—252.

Description

The painting depicts the Montagne Sainte-Victoire, which dominates the landscape of his native city of Aix-en-Provence (southern France). The city is visible in the distance, far back from the valley of the Arc River.Mont Sainte-Victoire. s885-i887. 2534 x 32' s inches. The H. 0. Havemeyer Collection, Bequest of Mrs. H. 0. Havemeyer, 29.100oo.6. Retrieved 30 June 2012. Moreover, this painting depicts the railway bridge on the Aix-Marseille line at the Arc River Valley and the train which runs on it. It is 65.5 cm × 81.7 cm (25.8 in × 32.2 in) in size, one of Cézanne's smallest works in his artistic career. Cézanne depicted the same mountain several other times, including in '' Mont Sainte-Victoire seen from Bellevue'', in '' Mont Sainte-Victoire with Large Pine'', in ''Plain by Mont Sainte-Victoire'', and in paintings titled simply ''Mont Sainte-Victoire'' in the holdings of the

Courtauld Institute of Art The Courtauld Institute of Art (), commonly referred to as The Courtauld, is a self-governing college of the University of London specialising in the study of the history of art and conservation. It is among the most prestigious specialist coll ...

in London and the

National Gallery of Scotland The Scottish National Gallery (formerly the National Gallery of Scotland) is the national art gallery of Scotland. It is located on The Mound in central Edinburgh, close to Princes Street. The building was designed in a neoclassical style by W ...

in Edinburgh. ''Mont Sainte-Victoire and the Viaduct of the Arc River Valley'' was painted near the end of his working career.Rewald, John. Cézanne and America: Dealers, Collectors, Artists, and Critics, 1891–1921. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989.Rewald, John. Cézanne: A Biography. New York: Abrams, 1986. In this painting, Cézanne explores the creation of depth using layers to build up a set of horizontal planes that draw the eye into the view.Voorhies, James
"Paul Cézanne (1839–1906)"
Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. Metropolitan Museum of Art. October 2004. Retrieved 30 June 2012. In 1989, this work was described as one of Cézanne's greatest.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mont Sainte-Victoire and the Viaduct of the Arc River Valley Paintings by Paul Cézanne 1880s paintings Paintings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art Water in art Trains in art Bridges in art Rivers in art

Background

Description

See also

References