Vincent Descombes, in his analysis of Proust's masterpiece, remarks that an artist can be called "modernist" if he fulfills three requirements. First of all, Descombes explains that a modernist artist needs to search for a subjective perception of the world; he must be able to "accueillir et traduire une impression individuelle" (Descombes 122) in order to create a work of art. Furthermore, the artist needs to break with the traditions established by the institutions of art: "Est moderniste l'artiste qui ressent l'exigence de bouleverser les formes d'art telles que la tradition les a transmises" (Descombes 151). Finally, Descombes suggests that a "modernist" work can only be understood by a fragmentation of it: "Marcel apprend qu'une authentique saisie esthétique passe par la mise en relief de la partie aux dépens du tout. Pour devenir un esthète accompli, Marcel doit être prêt à sacrifier le tout de l'oeuvre ou du spectacle afin d'en mieux apprécier l'individualité. Celle-ci ne brille que dans un éclat individuel" (Descombes 122).

Paradoxically, the father of modern art does not fulfill any of the three requirements established by Vincent Descombes. Herbert Read explains that "There is no doubt that what we call the modern movement in art begins with the single-minded determination of a French painter to see the world objectively" (Read 13). How, then, does the work of Paul Cézanne open the way to the modernist movement? The examination of a series of paintings portraying the same motif and scanning twenty years of the painter's career can begin to shed light on this mystery. In fact, the evolution of Cézanne's style points towards four general directions. First, his paintings become more and more auto-reflexive; second, they affirm a certain relativity; third, the drawing is sacrificed to the colors; and finally, the unity of the work is fragmented into a mosaic of shapes.

Michel Foucault has pointed out that the history of literature since the XIXth century shows an ever-increasing auto-reference to its medium: "[la littérature] devient pure et simple manifestation d'un langage qui n'a pour loi que d'affirmer. . .

existence escarpée; elle n'a plus qu'à se recourber dans un perpétuel retour sur soi, comme si son discsours ne pouvait avoir pour contenu que de dire sa propre forme" (Descombes 94). Butler acknowledges this auto-reference of modern art: "Modernist art calls attention to itself--as did Cézanne in accommodating his drawing and design to the rectangular shape of the canvas" (Butler 15). Certainly, the spatial disposition of the objects in Cézanne's canvases call attention to themselves by their awkward perspective. Yet, Cézanne, by sacrificing the drawing of the objects themselves and giving full rein to the colors in the canvas, calls attention to the medium that he is using. In other words, the viewer cannot but remark that he is looking at a painting when the drawing is unintelligible. This technique, of course, breaks with the realist tradition which, on the contrary, wanted to hide its own procedures and produce an illusion for the viewer.

The realist tradition, which proclaimed a universal truth, is going to be questioned by Cézanne's work. Cézanne produced a large number of paintings representing the St. Victoire mountain viewed from different angles. In this way, the mountain's reality is called into question; it becomes the empty center which can never be seized in its entirety. Butler explains that the repetition of a certain motif reinforces the relativity of truth: "Relativism is built into this practice, and it is another affront to realism, because we can see that no one version can claim to be adequate to the complexity of the objects it purports to represent" (Butler 14). This futile search for the true perspective opens the way to the cubist experiment which tries to accommodate a multiplicity of perspectives into a two-dimensional canvas[1].

Even though Cézanne's work subverts the realist tradition of a universal truth, it must be noted that this was not Cézanne's purpose. Ironically, the painter wanted instead to paint objectively: "Cézanne wished to exclude this shimmering and ambiguous surface of things and penetrate to the reality that did not change, that was present beneath the bright but deceptive picture presented by the kaleidoscope of the senses" (Read 13). In his paintings of the St. Victoire mountain, this search for the truth is expressed by an abandon of the lines that form the drawing. In the paintings of 1885 and 1887, the drawing is still the most important element in the works. The outline of the mountain is well defined and stands out against the sky. In the painting of 1887, however, the viewer can begin to notice a shift, particularly in the foreground, which starts to break up into a mosaic of colors and geometric figures. This change becomes even more apparent in the painting of 1897. The drawing of the mountain is still very important, but on the lower left hand corner the grass is broken up into patches of colors. The mountain itself succumbs to this process in 1902, where the line that defines the outline of St. Victoire is blurred with the sky. By 1906, the mountain becomes a mosaic of different colors, especially in the third painting of that year, where the viewer can no longer distinguish the mountain at all. In fact, this last painting represents an explosion of colors in the canvas, and the geometric pattern foreshadows the cubist aesthetic.

This movement towards abandoning the lines that separate the objects in the canvas is paralleled by a movement towards a fragmentation of the image. The contrast between the painting of 1887 and the last one of 1906 shows this transition. In the former, the lines are smooth and flow evenly towards the focal point, the St. Victoire mountain. The aqueduct and the river run towards the background dominated by the mountain, which is framed by two trees. The viewer's gaze is thus guided by the elements in the painting towards the mountain. The painting of 1906, by contrast, represents a series of geometric figures of different colors. The objects have become unintelligible and the viewer is faced with a fragmented picture. Yet, for Cézanne, this fragmentation was the only way to achieve unity: "Modulation means rather the achievement of one area of colour to its neighbouring areas of color: a continuous process of reconciling multiplicity with an overall unity. . .The result, in terms of paint-application, is an apparent breaking up of the flat surface of a colour-area into a mosaic of separate colour-facets" (Read 18). Roger Fry's description of the "Bathers resting" apply as well to this work of 1906:
"It is rather by the exact placing of plastic units than by continuous flowing silhouettes that the design holds" (Fry 133). Talking about a portrait of Mme. Cézanne, he states that "all is reduced to the purest terms of structural design" (Fry 133). These two comments can thus explain the latter representations of the St. Victoire mountain. These representations are characterized by a juxtaposition of geometric figures which stand out by their color.

Cézanne, without ever wanting to produce a revolution in art history--he was on the contrary rather conservative by nature--opens the way to the modernist movement. His work stands on the threshold of a new vision and it tries precariously to balance an old, traditional vision with a new aesthetic. No, Cézanne was not a modernist by Descombe's standards. He did not want to find a subjective perspective--he abandoned the impressionists exactly for this reason--but rather he wanted to find the path towards the truth. He did not want to break with tradition, but instead he wanted to reinterpret "Poussin entirely from nature." He did not want to fragment the work of art, but he wanted to find the unity inherent in nature and translate it in his canvas. Ironically, Cézanne's work liberates art by affirming exactly the opposite of what he had intended. His paintings establish a subjective vision of the world that champions the fragmentation of our vision and reinforces the relativism of truth. Thus, art is freed from the shackles of mimesis and the artist can now look within himself for inspiration.

Works Cited

Fry, Roger. "Paul Cézanne." in Cézanne by Ambroise Vollard. New York: Dover Publications, Inc. 1984.

Read, Herbert. A Concise History of Modern Painting. London: Thames and Hudson Ltd. 1974.

Descombes, Vincent. Proust: Philosophie du roman. Paris: Les Editions de Minuit. 1987.

Prous, Marcel. A l'ombre des jeunes filles en fleurs. Paris: Editions Gallimard, 1954.

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