L’Estaque

Even by the end of the nineteenth century L’Estaque was a busy little market town, with around twenty brick and tile manufacturers. Then, it was about ten kilometres from Marseilles, although now it is part of the industrial suburbs of the city. L’Estaque is only about thirty kilometres from Aix-en-Provence, and CŽzanne’s first recorded visit to the town took place in 1864. It is probable, as John Rewald suggests, that for several years before then CŽzanne’s mother had been renting a fisherman’s cottage there during the summer months. The blue waters of the Mediterranean held a strong attraction for the young Paul, and later, in Mes Confidences, he said that swimming was his favourite means of relaxation.
	L’Estaque became the refuge to which he escaped from family conflicts. He went there with Hortense Fiquet during the Franco-Prussian War (1870–1871), and it was there that he painted his first outdoor studies: a vertiginous snowscape and a bay in evening light. In 1876 he painted several coastal views for the collector Victor Chocquet, including ‘red roofs against the blue sea’. He was enchanted by the place, with the rocks overhanging