Cézanne, Paul (1839-1906)
Le Barrage de François Zola (The François Zola Dam)
c.1879
Oil on canvas, 54.2 x 74.2 cm
National Museum Wales, Cardiff
The dam was designed by Italian-born engineer François Zola, the father of novelist Émile Zola. In 1885 this painting belonged to Paul Gauguin, who copied it in gouache and mused that ‘the path winding across the broken ground through the young trees reminded [him] of the lonely path along which Christ wandered in sombre thought towards the Mount of Olives’. (NMW)
See also:
• Barrage Zola (Le Tholonet) | François Zola (1796-1847)