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Artwork

Portrait de l'artiste à la casquette (Self-Portrait in a Casquette)

Paul Cézanne , 1875

Portrait de l'artiste à la casquette (Self-Portrait in a Casquette) is an oil painting by the Post-Impressionist artist Paul Cézanne. It dates from 1875 and is held in the collection of the Hermitage Museum.

About this work

Subject & Meaning

Cézanne presents himself wearing a casquette, the soft, visored cap that gives the work its title and serves as its principal identifying attribute.

The painting is a self-portrait in which Paul Cézanne depicts himself as the sole subject, identified in the work's records as a man and as the main subject of the composition. Cézanne presents himself wearing a casquette, the soft, visored cap that gives the work its title and serves as its principal identifying attribute. The cap, a casual item of working-class or sporting dress rather than formal attire, functions as the iconographic anchor of the portrait, signaling an informal, unidealized self-presentation rather than the conventional trappings of the bourgeois sitter.

Beyond this identifying headgear, the painting offers no overt symbolic program; its meaning lies in the act of self-presentation itself. By choosing the casquette as the defining feature of his likeness, Cézanne frames the work as a deliberately modest, even self-effacing statement of identity, in keeping with the broader character of his self-portrait practice.

Technique & Style

Portrait de l'artiste à la casquette is an oil painting on canvas dated to 1875. The work measures 53 cm in height and 39.7 cm in width, and is executed on a plain woven canvas support primed for oil media. It depicts the artist wearing a casquette, rendered as a half‑length self‑portrait.

The sources record the medium as oil paint and the support as canvas, but do not provide details on brush handling, surface condition, or specific stylistic qualities.

History & Provenance

Painted in 1875, this self‑portrait shows Cézanne wearing a cap. It entered the collection of Russian merchant Ivan Morozov before being acquired by the Hermitage Museum, where it remains on display.

The work measures 53 cm by 39.7 cm and is executed in oil on canvas.

Portrait de l'artiste à la casquette (Self-Portrait in a Casquette) is held at the Hermitage Museum, where it is cataloged under the inventory number that records its acquisition from the collection of Ivan Morozov. The work was created in France in 1875 and has been displayed in several Hermitage exhibitions focusing on Cézanne's self-portraits and Post-Impressionist holdings.

Overview

Created in 1875, this oil-on-canvas work presents Paul Cézanne looking directly at the viewer while wearing a flat black cap. The figure is set against a muted, gray‑brown backdrop that recedes gently, emphasizing the sitter’s thoughtful expression and modest smile. The painting resides in the State Hermitage Museum, where it forms part of the museum’s 19th‑century French collection.

Context

Painted during Cézanne’s mature period, the work aligns with his broader efforts to reconcile observation with abstraction. At a time when the artist was moving beyond the fleeting effects of Impressionism, this portrait demonstrates his interest in building solid underlying structures, a concern that would shape modernist developments in the decades that followed.

L'Homme au chapeau de paille (Gustave Boyer in a Straw Hat), Paul Cézanne

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Artist & collection

Artist

Paul Cézanne

Paul Cézanne ( say-ZAN, UK also siz-AN, US also say-ZAHN; French: ; Occitan: Pau Cesana; 19 January 1839 – 22 October 1906) was a French Post-Impressionist painter whose work introduced new modes of representation,…