 | Château NoirBeginning in 1887, Cézanne rented a small room at Château Noir, where he stored his material and the works in progress he painted in the pistachio arbor surrounding the property.
Between 1887 and 1905, he painted 19 oils and 20 watercolors around Château Noir: the unfinished house that he saw through the trees, the Maria house on the edge of the pathway, the cistern and the well, the millstone, the underwoods and their pines, the rocks and the caves at the cliffs, and of course Sainte-Victoire, which he painted from the Tholonet road, were his main sources of inspiration. There Cézanne found the calm necessary for him to paint, and a haven away from indiscreet glances. It is true that the place was hardly attractive. The place had sorry reputation: one of its owners apparently painted the face of the building black, a curious choice in a region of golden stone. Cézanne was able to paint there in complete peace. During the summer of 1897, he regularly went to Tholonet where he was accustomed to having lunch at Rosa Bern's restaurant, a current Cézanne site. Between two courses, he wrote to his friends Joachim Gasquet, Philippe, and Emile Solari. It is to the latter that he wrote on September 8th, 1897: “Your father will come to eat duck with me next Sunday. The accompaniment will be olives (for the duck of course)”. This dish, prepared by Rosa Bern, was Cézanne's favorite.
Cézanne is so comfortable at Château Noir that after the sale of Jas de Bouffan, in September 1899, he offered to buy it from its owners. In spite of their refusal, he continued to paint there between 1899 and 1902, when he moved into the Lauves Studio, and then again between 1904 and 1906.
Poets Joachim Gasquet and Léo Larguier, and the painter Émile Bernard sometimes accompanied him to Château Noir in a carriage he rented for the year to return to the motif or to his studio outside the city when he grew tired. This carriage was driven by a coachman by the name of Emery. On October 8th, 1906 Cézanne complained of his coachman: “Emery raised the price of the carriage three francs for a round-trip, and five francs when I went to Château Noir. I let him go.” |
