Cezanne in Paris

“With an apple, I will astonish Paris,” Cézanne said. And so he did. And even today, still does.

We've seen two exceptional exhibitions featuring Cezanne in the last two weeks. The first, "Cezanne et Paris" is showing at the Musée du Luxembourg until February 26th. Cezanne is usually associated with Aix en Provence, however, he spent over half of his life painting in Paris and its environs. This is one of the more well known images from that exhibit.

This week we revisited Cezanne - plus Matisse and Picasso - at the Grand Palais for a special exhibit featuring the Stein collection. The Stein family - the writer Gertrude Stein, and her two brothers Leo and Michael, moved to Paris in the early twentieth century. They were among the first collectors of the paintings of Matisse and Picasso and this exhibit traces the impact of their support of avant garde art. Here are a few examples of the works featured here.

By the way, if you missed the exhibit in Paris, you can see it at the NY Metropolitan Museum of Art from Feb 28 - Jun 3, 2012