''Homage to Cézanne'' () is a painting in oil on canvas by the French artist

Maurice Denis Maurice Denis (; 25 November 1870 – 13 November 1943) was a French painter, decorative artist, and writer. An important figure in the transitional period between impressionism and modern art, he is associated with '' Les Nabis'', symbolism, ...

dating from 1900.Maurice Denis ''Homage to Cézanne''
Musée d'Orsay, 2006. Retrieved 17 June 2014. It depicts a number of key figures from the once secret brotherhood of

Les Nabis The Nabis (, ) were a group of young French artists active in Paris from 1888 until 1900, who played a large part in the transition from Impressionism and academic art to abstract art, symbolism and the other early movements of modernism. The me ...

(Hebr. the Prophets). The painting is a retrospective; by 1900 the group was breaking up as its members matured.

Subject matter and composition

In this painting, Maurice Denis has gathered a group of friends, artists and critics to celebrate

Paul Cézanne Paul Cézanne ( , , ; ; ; 19 January 1839 – 22 October 1906) was a French Post-Impressionism, Post-Impressionist painter whose work introduced new modes of representation, influenced avant-garde artistic movements of the early 20th century a ...

, who is represented by his

still life A still life (: still lifes) is a work of art depicting mostly wikt:inanimate, inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which are either natural (food, flowers, dead animals, plants, rocks, shells, etc.) or artificiality, human-m ...

''Fruit Bowl, Glass and Apples'' of 1879–80 on an easel in the centre of the painting. The scene is the shop of the art dealer

Ambroise Vollard Ambroise Vollard (; 3 July 1866 – 21 July 1939) was a French art dealer who is regarded as one of the most important dealers in French contemporary art at the beginning of the twentieth century. He is credited with being a major supporter an ...

in the Rue Laffitte. The Cézanne painting had belonged to

Paul Gauguin Eugène Henri Paul Gauguin (; ; 7 June 1848 – 8 May 1903) was a French painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramist, and writer, whose work has been primarily associated with the Post-Impressionist and Symbolist movements. He was also an influ ...

who is thus evoked, despite not being pictured, having left France permanently in 1895 for the South Seas. Gauguin described the Cézanne as "an exceptional pearl, the apple of my eye." Works by Gauguin and Renoir can be seen in the background. Pictured are many of the key figures from the secret brotherhood of the Nabis, for whom Gauguin was the principal mentor. Included are the

symbolist Symbolism or symbolist may refer to: *Symbol, any object or sign that represents an idea Arts *Artistic symbol, an element of a literary, visual, or other work of art that represents an idea ** Color symbolism, the use of colors within various c ...

painter

Odilon Redon Odilon Redon (born Bertrand Redon; ; 20 April 18406 July 1916) was a French Symbolist painting, Symbolist draftsman, printmaker, and painter. Early in his career, both before and after fighting in the Franco-Prussian War, Redon worked almost exc ...

, the focus of attention on the far left, Paul Sérusier (Nabi instigator) centre talking to Redon, and at the back, left to right,

Édouard Vuillard Jean-Édouard Vuillard (; 11 November 186821 June 1940) was a French painter, decorative artist, and printmaker. From 1891 through 1900, Vuillard was a member of the avant garde artistic group Les Nabis, creating paintings that assembled areas ...

, the critic André Mellerio wearing a top hat, Ambroise Vollard behind the easel, Maurice Denis, Paul Ranson, Ker-Xavier Roussel,

Pierre Bonnard Pierre Bonnard (; 3 October 186723 January 1947) was a French painter, illustrator and printmaker, known especially for the stylized decorative qualities of his paintings and his bold use of color. A founding member of the Post-Impressionist gr ...

with a pipe, and on the far right Marthe Denis, Maurice's wife. In some ways different from the others, Redon is the group's revered senior figure. Sérusier appears to be explaining to Redon why the Nabis like Cézanne based on his posture.''Masterpieces from Paris: Homage to Cézanne''

National Gallery of Australia The National Gallery of Australia (NGA), formerly the Australian National Gallery, is the national art museum of Australia as well as one of the largest art museums in Australia, holding more than 166,000 works of art. Located in Canberra in th ...

, 2009. Retrieved 17 June 2014. Over time, Redon had come to be more closely associated with Cézanne than with Symbolist fellow traveller

Gustave Moreau Gustave Moreau (; 6 April 1826 – 18 April 1898) was a French artist and an important figure in the Symbolist movement. Jean Cassou called him "the Symbolist painter par excellence".Cassou, Jean. 1979. ''The Concise Encyclopedia of Symbolism ...

. Lucie-Smith, Edward. (1972) ''Symbolist Art''. London:

Thames & Hudson Thames & Hudson (sometimes T&H for brevity) is a publisher of illustrated books in all visually creative categories: art, architecture, design, photography, fashion, film, and the performing arts. It also publishes books on archaeology, history, ...

, p. 75. Redon's inclusion in the picture is not surprising; Denis was a fan of Redon and once remarked "the lesson of Redon is his powerlessness to paint anything which is not representative of a state of soul, which does not express some depth of emotion, which does not translate an interior vision." The picture is almost life size at 180 cm high and 240 cm broad, which enhances its impact. The composition has strong verticals in the erect poses of the subjects, the easel and the walking stick, against which the brightly coloured rectangle of the framed still life is contrasted. The scene is crowded. Vollard is grasping the easel which is bursting out of the top edge of the painting, and the figures fully occupy the space of the canvas, leaving little room for anything else. Mrs Denis is reduced to peering over Bonnard's shoulder. Contrasting the strong verticals, the heads of the group provide a horizontal rhythm to the work. The conservative black suits belie the

avant-garde In the arts and literature, the term ''avant-garde'' ( meaning or ) identifies an experimental genre or work of art, and the artist who created it, which usually is aesthetically innovative, whilst initially being ideologically unacceptable ...

reputation of the Nabis.

Significance

Henri Fantin-Latour - A Studio at Les Batignolles - Google Art Project

Belinda Thomson described ''Homage to Cézanne'' as Denis "turning away from the more spectacular, subjective Symbolism of Gauguin and van Gogh towards what he saw as the reassertion of classical values in Cézanne.""Denis, Maurice." Belinda Thomson, ''Grove Art Online, Oxford Art Online'',

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the publishing house of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world. Its first book was printed in Oxford in 1478, with the Press officially granted the legal right to print books ...

. Retrieved 18 June 2014. Denis had visited Rome with Gide in 1898 where he had discovered a renewed interest in classicism. He subsequently published articles such as "Cézanne" in 1907 and "De Gauguin et de Van Gogh au classicisme" in 1909 which argued that classicism was at the core of French cultural tradition. By doing so, he influenced a new generation of French artists. A possible antecedent for the work is '' A Studio at Les Batignolles'' (1870) by

Henri Fantin-Latour Henri Fantin-Latour (; 14 January 1836 – 25 August 1904) was a French painter and lithographer best known for his flower paintings and group portraits of Parisian artists and writers. Early life Born in Grenoble, Isère, Ignace Henri Jean Th� ...

, which features, amongst others,

Édouard Manet Édouard Manet (, ; ; 23 January 1832 – 30 April 1883) was a French Modernism, modernist painter. He was one of the first 19th-century artists to paint modern life, as well as a pivotal figure in the transition from Realism (art movement), R ...

, Pierre-Auguste Renoir,

Émile Zola Émile Édouard Charles Antoine Zola (, ; ; 2 April 184029 September 1902) was a French novelist, journalist, playwright, the best-known practitioner of the literary school of Naturalism (literature), naturalism, and an important contributor to ...

and

Claude Monet Oscar-Claude Monet (, ; ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of Impressionism painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During his ...

Exhibitions

''Homage to Cézanne'' was shown at the Salon de la Société nationale des beaux-arts, Paris, 1901, and the Salon de la Libre Esthétique, Brussels, Belgium, 1901. It was not shown again in an exhibition until 1948. Reactions in 1901 were mixed. Denis referred to the work in his diary as "that painting, which still makes the public laugh".Letter to André Gide in Maurice Denis, ''Journal'', Vol. 1, Paris: La Colombe, 1957, p. 168.

History

''Homage to Cézanne'' was in the collection of the writer

André Gide André Paul Guillaume Gide (; 22 November 1869 – 19 February 1951) was a French writer and author whose writings spanned a wide variety of styles and topics. He was awarded the 1947 Nobel Prize in Literature. Gide's career ranged from his begi ...

who donated it to the

Musée du Luxembourg The () is a museum at 19 in the 6th arrondissement of Paris. Established in 1750, it was initially an art museum located in the east wing of the Luxembourg Palace (the matching west wing housed the Marie de' Medici cycle by Peter Paul Rubens) an ...

in 1928. It then entered three other collections in Paris: the

Musée National d'Art Moderne The Musée National d'Art Moderne (; "National Museum of Modern Art") is the national museum for modern art of France. It is located in the 4th arrondissement of Paris and is housed in the Centre Pompidou. In 2021 it ranked 10th in the list of ...

, in 1977, then

The Louvre The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is a national art museum in Paris, France, and one of the most famous museums in the world. It is located on the Rive Droite, Right Bank of the Seine in the city's 1st arrondissement of Paris, 1st arron ...

and finally the

Musée d'Orsay The Musée d'Orsay ( , , ) () is a museum in Paris, France, on the Rive Gauche, Left Bank of the Seine. It is housed in the former Gare d'Orsay, a Beaux-Arts architecture, Beaux-Arts railway station built from 1898 to 1900. The museum holds mai ...

. A preparatory drawing is held in a private collection in

Saint-Germain-en-Laye Saint-Germain-en-Laye () is a Communes of France, commune in the Yvelines Departments of France, department in the Île-de-France in north-central France. It is located in the western suburbs of Paris, from the Kilometre Zero, centre of Paris. ...

. Maurice Denis ''Hommage à Cézanne'' en 1900 Notice de l'œuvre
Musée d'Orsay, 2014. Retrieved 17 June 2014.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Homage to Cezanne 1900 paintings Nabis (art) Paintings in the Musée d'Orsay Paul Cézanne Paintings about painting Portraits of Ambroise Vollard