The Bathers (large plate)

Paul Cézanne’s color lithograph of nude bathers who rest and preen in a landscape setting features multiple motifs that reappeared throughout his career. These include the distinctive mountain, Mont Sainte-Victoire, he viewed from his studio in the south of France. He had also already drawn nude male figures countless times and from different angles. His rigorous internalization of familiar elements permitted him to reach beyond simply depicting an object, landscape, or person, to explore the nature of representation itself.

This print was commissioned by the Parisian art dealer Ambroise Vollard, and printed by master printer Auguste Clot. Cézanne drew the black lines of the composition on a specially treated paper, and Clot transferred the image to a lithographic stone. The artist then made watercolor additions to a print taken from the stone, and Clot created separate stones for each color, printing the colors one after another.