New Copy - Cézanne's "Still Life with Apples and Peaches"

Today I started a new copy, of Cézanne's "Still Life with Apples and Peaches". This was a painting I wanted to do last winter, but was told that it was scheduled to go on loan in June. But it never went. I requested it again, and got permission to copy it.

According to the National Gallery's web site, the original painting is 31 7/8" x 39 9/16". I used my handy-dandy "Painting Resizer", an Excel spreadsheet that my husband made for me (thank you Hal!) to find a size that would be at least 2" smaller (NGA rules) and be as close as possible to whole inches (the only way commercial stretcher bars come.) The first number I plugged in to the spreadsheet was 29", and it came out with exactly 36" for the width! Very cool. I stretched and gessoed the canvas, and drew a light grid with pencil, so I could more easily copy this complicated still life. Finding the centers on the original is easy because the frame has a detail in the centers of the sides. Having the centers and quarters marked on my blank canvas saved me a lot of time and effort.

I worked on the drawing for about two hours and then stopped for lunch.

 (click for a larger view)

After lunch I started painting. I really didn't know where to start, so I just started putting in the dark background and the table. I worked until almost 3:30 and then started feeling tired. I want to go slowly on this one, because I've heard that Cézanne was a very slow painter. He would paint and repaint, and move his easel to get different details not visible from his first vantage point. This is why his paintings do not have conventional perspective. He was aware that he could move slightly and see a very different looking thing, so he incorporated that into his painting. Because of this, Cézanne is considered to be the father of many of the modern art movements of the 20th century.

Here is where I stopped for the day. I'll be back in two weeks to continue!