Olga's Gallery

Paul Cézanne was born into a family of Italian origin in Cesana Forinese. His father had established a felt hat business in Aix-en-Provence and later became a banker. In 1859 he bought a country house on the outskirts of Aix, the Jas de Bouffan, which was to be frequently represented in Cézanne’s paintings.
            Between 1852 and 1859 Paul Cézanne studied at the Collège Bourbon and it was there that he formed a friendship with Emile Zola, with whom he shared an interest in literature. In 1856 Cézanne began to attend the evening drawing courses of Joseph-Marc Gibert at the Aix Museum. From 1859 to 1861 he studied law at Aix, entered his father’s bank. By April 1861 his father had finally yielded to Cézanne’s desire to make a career in art and allowed him to go to Paris to study at the Académie Suisse. In Paris Cézanne frequented the Louvre, met Pissarro and Guillaumin and, later on, Monet, Sisley, Bazille and Renoir. In September of the same year he was refused admission to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and went back to Aix, to the great relief of his father, who offered him a position in his bank. But in November 1862 Paul Cézanne went back to Paris and took up painting again. Read Paul Cézanne's Full Biography