Paul Cézanne 18391906 was one of the most influential artists of his day, producing work derived from the most acute sensibility at grips with the most searching rationality according to his friend, the writer Joachim Gasquet. Honoring tradition while also challenging it, his example made possible the advances of numerous younger artists such as Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, and Georges Braque, thereby paving the way for the emergence of modern art. Cézannes novel approach was evident as much in his drawings and watercolors as in his oil paintings. While the hundreds of drawings that the artist left behind in his sketchbooks confirm the centrality of this medium to his artistic practice, his watercolors from the 1890s were undertaken as works of art in their own right.
