Strada con alberi tra montagne rocciose

France declared war on Prussia in July 1870, and Cezanne, then 31 and liable for call-up, went south and kept out of sight at L'Estaque, a village on the bay outside Marseille. The authorities looked for him in Aix, where his mother told them she had no idea where he was. Paris was besieged that winter and torn up by the Commune the following spring. He spent those months on the hillside with a canvas. A path opens in the foreground here, then trees and rock shut the view down, so the countryside behind never arrives, and the broad rhythmical strokes flatten the space instead of opening it. The picture came to Frankfurt in 1929, catalogued as 1870 to 1871, the two years he was in hiding.