"I do not just paint what I see, I paint what I feel": the post-impressionist paintings by Paul Cézanne (1839-1906) turned out to be the starting points of the 20th century painting. The representatives of cubism and fauvism such as Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse led their art directly back to Cézanne. He was one of the first painters who consciously changed formats and perspectives in their paintings in order to achieve special effects and liveliness.

He was was born on 19 January 1839 in Aix-en-Provence in the family of a middle-class banker. Cézanne got artistic recognition very late, so most of his life he was financially dependent on his father. Continuous rejections of the Paris Ecole des Beaux-Arts and the constant rejection of the salons made him an unsociable person. When he left the education of a lawyer, which was preferred by his father, he continued his self-study in arts. His examples were Rubens, Delacroix and Poussin.He often worked and took part in mutual exhibition together with impressionists. But his style was different from that of impressionism, as he wanted to create a “strong and permanent art”. Only some special traits, like light color palette and shining colorfulness made him close to impressionism.

Cézanne painted the landscapes of the Aix-en-Provence, still lives and the scenes of the everyday life. Those made the majority of his motifs in which he wanted to represent his perception of world and nature. He developed a new conception of color, space and form, which was taken for an example by the next generations. He can be rightly called “the father of modern.”

The importance of his works was recognized only after his first individual exhibition in Paris 1895. It was followed by other exhibitions after which his paintings became demanded artworks. Later they were sold at high prices. Nevertheless, emotional state and health worsened rapidly. Even his wife and son, who both lived in Paris, could not get through to him. Cézanne died lonely from pneumonia in his studio in Aix-en-Provence on October 22, 1906.

The "myth of Cézanne" was thought up a year later in a large memorial exhibition of 56 paintings.