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Lot Essay
La Clairire was painted when Czanne was in his twenties. Applying pigment directly on the canvas with a small palette knife, Czanne created forceful images of the Provenal landscape near Aix. The technique built on Courbet's radical images of Ornans from the 1850s and 1860s. At the time Czanne's paintings had caused a sensation when they were exhibited because of their unconventional handling of form. According to Lawrence Gowing, "...[Czanne] instinctively understood that in the new age the handling was the picture" (L. Gowing, Czanne: The Late Work, exh. cat., The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1977, p. 56). While Courbet captured the rugged harshness of the environs of Ornans in dark hues of green and brown, La clairire depicts the more brilliant color of the south of France. The sun drenched palette of La clairire is suggestive of Diaz de la Pea's richly colored views of the forest of Fontainebleau that Czanne may have seen when they were shown at the Salon in Marseille.
In October 1866 Czanne wrote to Emile Zola that nothing done in the studio would ever equal what was done outdoors. He worked en plein air, constructing images out of "tonal slabs" in an almost sculptural manner with the palette knife. La clairire exemplifies the goal of the new art as outlined by Zola in L'Evenement in 1866: "It is not the tree, the countenance, the scene offered to me in a picture that touches me; it is the man whom I find in the work, the powerful individual who has known how to create alongside God's world a personal world in which my eyes will never forget and which they will recognize everywhere" (quoted in L. Gowing, Czanne: The Early Years, exh. cat., Royal Academy of Arts, London, 1988, p. 10).
La clairire conveys the effect of the midday light as it shines down on a forest clearing. The vigorous technique allows Czanne to produce a great richness of nuances and textures to the scene. Though the picture conveys the impression of Czanne working in a spontaneous manner, the balance of form and color shows a sophisticated understanding of composition that presages his later paintings.
In October 1866 Czanne wrote to Emile Zola that nothing done in the studio would ever equal what was done outdoors. He worked en plein air, constructing images out of "tonal slabs" in an almost sculptural manner with the palette knife. La clairire exemplifies the goal of the new art as outlined by Zola in L'Evenement in 1866: "It is not the tree, the countenance, the scene offered to me in a picture that touches me; it is the man whom I find in the work, the powerful individual who has known how to create alongside God's world a personal world in which my eyes will never forget and which they will recognize everywhere" (quoted in L. Gowing, Czanne: The Early Years, exh. cat., Royal Academy of Arts, London, 1988, p. 10).
La clairire conveys the effect of the midday light as it shines down on a forest clearing. The vigorous technique allows Czanne to produce a great richness of nuances and textures to the scene. Though the picture conveys the impression of Czanne working in a spontaneous manner, the balance of form and color shows a sophisticated understanding of composition that presages his later paintings.