Artists copying artists: Cézanne & Millet

Artists have always copied the works of other artists. And the primary purpose of this exercise – when carried out with serious intent – has always been to learn: to look closely, not at the technique, but at the discernible intentions and thought processes of the artist whose work is being studied. So it is that ‘copying’ is an unhappy word to describe what is – at its best – a creative process; and ‘creative process’ has also been diminished by its loose application to ‘workshops’ and courses promising to ‘unleash your creative potential.’ It has almost become a portmanteau word for anything that is new, quite regardless of its actually having intrinsic worth – though I agree that ‘intrinsic worth’ is thornily subjective, and bound to remain so.

Millet. The Reaper. c. 1852. Black
chalk. Private collection

However this latter problem need not concern us about the two drawings I am going to compare, both of which are subtle, strong, and instinct with life: Millet’s The Reaper and Cézanne’s study after this drawing.

Millet’s Reaper is drawn in black chalk, and Cézanne’s study in pencil. And the use of the different mediums is perhaps what strikes us most immediately. Millet’s black chalk does not allow of preliminary, explorative, or tentative lines; as with watercolour, if you do not get it right first time you are lost. From this point of view it is surprising that the visible hand of the reaper in Millet’s drawing is such a seemingly inconsequential jumble of lines. However, this would certainly not be intentional, and I think that it represents some trials that were abandoned in the interest of the dynamics of the figure as a whole. After all, Millet’s drawing was a study too, and to have started over on account of this unresolved area would hardly have made sense. 

Cézanne. Study after a Millet
drawing: The Reaper. Pencil

However, there is a sense in which Millet’s drawing is more ‘finished’ than that of Cézanne. Millet has paid considerable attention to light and shade, and to the tucks and folds of the reaper’s shirt. Cézanne, by contrast, has scarcely concerned himself with these details, and has reduced them to a minimum: three or four at most. And in this respect has made a more modern drawing. Attractive as they are, many of Millet’s firmly drawn creases serve little purpose in indicating the angle of the reaper’s torso. Cezanne, we may say, has seized upon the essentials, and breathed a liveliness into his drawing that Millet has not achieved. He has done this by concentrating on the essentials, and making a wholeness of the figure that eluded Millet. For example, the belt of Millet’s reaper may be said to have effectively made of the torso an element separate from the rest of his body. Not so Cézanne! Just look at the wonderful contrast between the angle of the rounded buttocks and the angle of the shoulders; and at the rounded line between the buttocks and the curved crease that Cézanne has emphasised on the shirt: taken

Cézanne. Study after a Millet
drawing: The Reaper. Pencil.
Detail

together, they form an elongated and flattened s–shape, providing a coherent continuity to the figure. And, in shifting the centre of gravity from the right to the left leg, Cézanne has given greater coherence to the labourer's figure: everything contributing to its forward muscular movement. Millet’s drawing does not lack movement, but in contrast to Cézanne’s it is static.