90. Celebrating the glories of Cezanne with Natalia Sidlina and Michael Raymond

Break Out Culture With Ed Vaizey by Country and Town House

This week Ed and I are celebrating our hundredth episode together since starting as Lock Down Culture in April 2020. We’re also celebrating Cezanne, one of the world’s most popular but enigmatic artists. A new show The EY Exhibition: Cezanne at Tate Modern has opened with 22 works never seen in the UK before, including some dazzling still lives that he’s loved for the world over. We talk to Natalia Sidlina, who’s worked at Tate Modern as Curator of International Art since 2016, and Assistant Curator Michael Raymond.

Natalia and Michael throw light on Cezanne’s early life in Paris, why he hid Paul, his beloved son and his mother, Marie-Hortense, from his father and why he gained such a reputation for being a taciturn loner. Unpicking the myths that have grown up around him, they explain why his work is of such enduring importance and revered and sought after by major artists from Gauguin and Monet to Matisse and Picasso. It’s a wonderful exhibition and Natalia and Michael persuade us why this is an unmissable chance to see so many of his best-loved paintings together, from his landscapes of Mont-San-Victoire and iconic apples to his bathers, that proved to have such an influence of generations of artists to come.