Right under the Sun. Landscape in Provence

From the Pax Romana to Peter Mayle, Provence's lovely climate and lively landscape have proven irresistible to visitors, and especially artists. The fabled landscape cheered up even Van Gogh, whose short but productive time there resulted in paintings in blazing golds and uncharacteristically bright letters to his brother. This exhibition catalogue collects some 180 works from a fertile century and a half of painting, encompassing Classicism, Romanticism, Naturalism, Impressionism, Post-Impressionism, Fauvism and Cubism. The tour of Provence starts with Vernet's high views of the port of Marseilles (a favorite subject of others as well), continues through late eighteenth-century celebrations of natural phenomena such as the gorges of Ollioules, and comprehensively covers the explosion of masterworks of the 1880s leading into the 1920s, including those by Monet, Renoir, Gauguin, Cezanne, Derain, Dufy and Braque. By primarily focusing on landscape, Right Under the Sun allows us to see these master artists anew, and offers insight into the development of Provencal painting, examining the effect of the harsh light and the rise of the panoramic compositional format.