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Self-Portrait with a Beret

Paul Cézanne (French, 1839–1906)
about 1898–1900

Medium/Technique Oil on canvas
Dimensions 64.1 x 53.3 cm (25 1/4 x 21 in.)
Credit Line Charles H. Bayley Picture and Painting Fund and Partial Gift of Elizabeth Paine Metcalf
Accession Number1972.950
CollectionsEurope
ClassificationsPaintings
Cézanne undertook a systematic campaign of self-portraiture during his career, rendering his own likeness in at least twenty-five paintings. This self-portrait is thought to be his last. He depicts himself with a noticeable degree of detachment; his eyes in particular lack detail and energy, projecting a sense of psychological distance. While passages of the painting appear unresolved—including the thinly painted surface of the jacket and the barely indicated chair—carefully rendered swaths of distinct color unite to form the artist’s cheekbone and forehead, suggesting the care with which he continued to compose his own, aging face.

ProvenanceAmbroise Vollard (b. 1867 - d. 1939), Paris; probably sold by Vollard to Egisto Fabbri (b. 1866 - d. 1933), Florence [see note 1]; November 15, 1928, sold by Fabbri to Georges Wildenstein and Paul Rosenberg and Co., Paris (stock no. 2266) [see note 2]; by 1929, sold by Rosenberg to Robert Treat Paine II (b. 1861 - d. 1943), Boston [see note 3]; by descent to his daughter, Elizabeth Paine Metcalf (Mrs. Thomas B. Card; b. 1896 - d. 1992), Boston; 1972, purchase and partial gift of Elizabeth Paine Metcalf to the MFA. (Accession Date: December 13, 1972)

NOTES:
[1] Egisto Fabbri was one of the first collectors to purchase the works of Cézanne through Vollard. He lent this painting to the Biennale, Venice, in 1920 (no. 25). [2] Fabbri sold thirteen of his Cézanne paintings to the dealers Georges Wildenstein and Paul Rosenberg of Paris. A document of November 15, 1928, confirms their receipt by intermediary Tammaro De Marinis, who oversaw their transport out of Italy. See Francesca Bardazzi, Cézanne in Florence: Two collectors and the 1910 exhibition of Impressionism (exh. cat. Palazzo Strozzi, Florence, March 2 - July 29, 2007), 25-26, 278, doc. 11. [3] Paine lent this painting to the exhibition "Cézanne, Gauguin, Seurat, van Gogh," Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1929, cat. no. 4.