The Drinker (Le Buveur)

The Drinker (1899) at the Barnes Foundation belongs to the period following Cézanne's great Card Players series (1890–95), depicting a single figure with a glass. Single-figure subjects allowed Cézanne to concentrate his structural method on one figure in relation to a relatively simple interior environment. By 1899 he was intensely self-critical and working in increasing solitude at Aix-en-Provence, largely estranged from the Paris art world. The Barnes Foundation's holding of this figure subject complements the card player figures in the collection.

The drinker's figure is built through large, simplified color planes that model form through contrast rather than blending. The glass and table relate to the figure through carefully controlled spatial placement. Cézanne's handling of flesh is characteristic—warm oranges and cool greens modulated to suggest three-dimensional form without conventional chiaroscuro.