Description
The Abduction – the earliest Cézanne in our range
The Abduction is a work of 1867, when Cézanne was twenty-eight and painting darkly, thickly and violently. A muscular man carries a limp female body through a gloomy landscape; in the distance two small figures bathe in the water. Our hand-painted reproduction on canvas brings this early, dramatic work into your home, painted in oil on canvas.
A painting that belonged to Zola
Cézanne gave the canvas to his childhood friend, the writer Émile Zola, and for a long time it hung in his house. The friendship between them later broke up, after Zola drew in his novel The Masterpiece the figure of a failed painter in whom Cézanne recognised himself.
Who is in the painting is not clear
The scene is usually connected with ancient stories of abduction – most often with the rape of Persephone, or with Heracles and Alcestis – but Cézanne never explained it, and there is no attribute on the canvas that would identify the figures unambiguously. We therefore treat it as an open question, not as an established fact.
What you see on the canvas
The two bodies are set at the centre as a dark and a light mass; the background is almost nocturnal, with a blue mountain and pale light above the horizon. The paint is thickly laid and the strokes are broad. The original is painted in oil on canvas, by the collection’s record measures 117 × 90 cm, and is held by the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge.
The painting Émile Zola was given
Cézanne gave this canvas to his childhood friend, the writer Émile Zola, and for many years it hung in his house. By the settled account their friendship ended in 1886, when Zola drew in his novel The Masterpiece (L’Œuvre) the figure of a failed, despairing painter in whom Cézanne is said to have recognised himself. More recent research softens that story – correspondence that has since come to light shows the two did not break off contact as abruptly as the legend has it. We give the story as the settled reading, not as a proven fact.
A dramatic canvas for a large room
The thick paint and the nocturnal scale are the reason we do not print this subject but paint it by hand. Choose among ten sizes or order to your own measurements. The canvas needs quiet surroundings and enough space around it. Check the frame in a realistic 3D preview. Among our reproductions of famous paintings you will find Cézanne’s other early compositions: Afternoon in Naples, The Large Bathers (Barnes) and The Bather.
- Subject: The Abduction, Paul Cézanne, 1867, Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge
- Technique: hand-painted painting, oil on canvas, reproduction
- Sizes: 10 formats, stretched on a wooden stretcher frame on request, or made to your measurements
- Fact: Cézanne gave the canvas to Émile Zola – the friend from whom he later parted
