Bathers Under a Bridge (recto); Study after Houdon's Ecorché (verso)

Bathers Under a Bridge (recto); Study after Houdon's Ecorché (verso) by Paul Cézanne, executed between 1894 and 1906, exemplifies the artist's sustained dedication to the motif of the bather and his transitional approach to form. The recto side, Bathers Under a Bridge, utilizes watercolor layered over a foundational graphite sketch, a technique Cézanne frequently employed in his late period to explore the interplay of fluid color and stable, geometric structure. The composition features monumental, generalized figures engaged in bathing activities near a rudimentary bridge structure. Cézanne renders the figures and the environment with broken planes and deliberate patches of color, demonstrating the evolution of his style toward formal simplification and early abstraction. The bridge element anchors the composition, providing a necessary counterpoint to the organic forms of the figures and the landscape.

The verso of the sheet offers a classical counterpoint: the Study after Houdon's Ecorché. Executed solely in graphite, Cézanne copies the famous anatomical figure originally cast by the sculptor Jean-Antoine Houdon. This juxtaposition of the formal academic study with the modernist interpretation of the bathing landscape reveals Cézanne's simultaneous adherence to and defiance of traditional artistic constraints. This significant dual-sided drawing, crucial for understanding the late works of the Post-Impressionist master, is a key piece in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Today, the high quality of this drawing allows institutions to release high-resolution prints of Cézanne's work into the public domain, making his foundational inquiries into human form and landscape accessible to scholars globally.