'Why Cezanne's Old Paintings Look Still Fresh in Our Times? 'Cézanne's Pictorial Depth

And it's Interpretation on Contemporary Art'

[Name of Course]

[Name of Tutor]

Date: -- / May / 2011

'Why Cezanne's Old Paintings Look Still Fresh in Our Times? 'Cézanne's Pictorial Depth

And it's Interpretation on Contemporary Art'

Introduction

Paul Cézanne has commonly been regarded as the father of Modern painting and we are living in post-modern times when Modernist's belief is losing its inspirational strength in our contemporary culture. Then, however, why art objects of Cézanne do still look astonishingly 'fresh' even in our times? Deciphering this enigma in Cézanne visual image would be the most pleasurable navigation to find out 'our way of seeing' and to closely touch our contemporary world.

In this essay, on the first step, Cezanne's unique perspective will be investigated with the help of key thinkers: Maurice Mealeau-Ponti, J.J. Gibson and Richard Shiff. Then, Cézanne's pictorial depth will be analyzed as an essential precursor of post-modern perspective with his two representational artworks. To begin with, Cezanne's concept of 'engagement' in The Montagne Sainte-Victoire with Large Pine (1834) will be discussed with Jeffrey Shaw's interactive artwork, The Cave (1977). Then, the idea of 'uncertainty' in Cezanne's Still Life with Plaster Cupid (1895) will be bridged to Gerhard Richter's photo-painting series, Woman with Umbrella" (1964) and Apples(1984).

Body 1: Maurice Merlay-Ponty's body-subjectivism

What is the difference between seeing and experiencing? The answer should be started from the issue of the body. According to Merleau Ponti's phenomenology, 'the body' is not just the physical object in the world that is controlled by 'the mind' that has been believed as the essence of human being on the tradition of Western philosophy. On the contrary to the dominant tradition of Subjectivism that human subject is not in the body but in the mind, M. Merleau Ponti argues that body is indeed 'the center' of being alive as human being and refers it to 'Body-subjectivism'.

Rene Descartes clearly defined the core idea of subjectivism. According to Cartesian view, mind is distinct from body and world and is an area of its own. In this sense, 'the world is as I see it'. Human's perception does not represent the world because the world is an expression of human's subjectivity. In other words, the working and laws of the subjectivity structure how I see the world; the world does not impact on my perception of it. The direction is absolutely from inside human's mind to the outside world.

Immanuel Kant further proposed that subjectivity cannot know the world because the world and the human mind are disparate realms. Subjectivity has its own intrinsic principles, such as ethical rules, that determine one's perception of the world. In this sense, the prevailing outlook of the world can be changed according to our way of 'interpreting' by the mind. And to withdraw our attention from the object of thoughts to thought itself and further on to the self-as-subject is to penetrate the centre of the nature of our experience.

On the other hand, ...