Paul Cézanne — Epilogue

1. 1. Cézanne's posthumous reputation was transformed by Vollard's marketing and his influence on avant-garde artists like Matisse, Picasso, and Braque.
2. 2. Cézanne's canonization as founder of modern tradition paradoxically threatens to make his art invisible by occluding what he regarded as most fundamental.
3. 3. Formalist interpretations dominated mid-20th century understanding of Cézanne, but they impoverished his art by ignoring its sensory and experiential contents.
4. 4. Cézanne warned against hagiography and slavish imitation, urging focus on the imperfect works and distrust of posthumous ovations.
5. 5. Cézanne's art evolved from a belligerent, willful style to a more deliberative and questioning approach, holding will and submission in fragile dialectical relation.
6. 6. Cézanne's later life was marked by solitude and immersion in nature, shaped by the demands of painting and a melancholic belief in the passing of his valued Provençal world.
7. 7. Cézanne's art sat uneasily within modernity, and its terms now seem remote, but its untimeliness preserves capacities and potentialities otherwise lost.