Cezanne: “Bords de la Marne” to be acquired by National Gallery of South Wales

Paul Cezanne – “Bords de la Marne”

Cezanne: “Bords de la Marne” to be acquired by National Gallery of South Wales

The Art Gallery of New South Wales announced the acquisition of a pivotal painting in the history of art: “Bords de la Marne” by Paul Cézanne

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This is the first painting by Paul Cézanne to enter the collection of the Art Gallery of NSW and as Margaret Olley said, “It will be the most important painting in the gallery.”

September 21st 2008 – “There’s everything in it to please the art lover.” That was the art dealer Ambroise Vollard’s verdict on Cézanne’s painting, Bords de la Marne, c1888. It was Vollard’s gallery that gave Cézanne his first ever survey exhibition in 1895.

Bords de la Marne is a majestically composed landscape which epitomises Cézanne’s classical qualities. The painting was painted not far from Paris in a region that has attracted many generations of artists. Cézanne must have enjoyed painting along the banks of the Marne River as it appears he returned to the region many times over the years.

“It speaks nothing but Cézanne in terms of composition, texture and brushstrokes,” Edmund Capon said of Bords de la Marne. “There are endless moments of intrigue – the reflections in the water, the way the village wall seems to curve around and out of sight, the solidity and concentration of the buildings, those greens…”