Mont Sainte-Victoire

By 1902 Cézanne was in his sixties, living quietly in Aix-en-Provence, and he had a new studio built on a hill called Les Lauves, just north of the town. From the slope above it he could see Mont Sainte-Victoire, the long limestone ridge that had stood over his childhood, and in his final four years he painted it over and over. This is one of those late versions. Up close the mountain barely holds together, built from separate patches of green, ochre and blue set side by side, the sky pressing down into the rock. Cézanne kept walking out to work in the open air until the end. In October 1906 he was caught in a storm while painting, collapsed, and died about a week later.