Feature: The Big Picture - Cézanne plays an ace
Published: 25 November, 2010
PAUL Cézanne’s famous paintings of peasant card players have long been considered to be among his most iconic and powerful works.
The landmark exhibition at the Courtauld Gallery is the first to bring together the majority of these remarkable paintings alongside a magnificent group of closely related portraits of Provençal peasants and rarely seen preparatory oil sketches, watercolours and exquisite drawings. The Courtauld Gallery’s two masterpieces from this series, “The Card Players” and “Man with a Pipe”, are joined by exceptional loans from international collections, including the Metropolitan Museum in New York, the Musée d’Orsay in Paris and the State Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg, to offer a visual feast of some of the artist’s finest paintings.
• The exhibition is accompanied by a series of events, including talks, Sunday tours and late night events. There is still time to book a place on the Study Day Cézanne’s Card Players in Context on December 11. To find out more call 020 7848 2678.
• ézanne’s Card Players is at The Courtauld Gallery, Somerset House, Strand, WC2, until January 16,
10am-6pm. Admission includes access to the permanent collection: £6; concessions £4.50. 020 7848 2526 www.courtauld.ac.uk/gallery/cezanne