More Than a Rock, 2nd Edition

24Artistic Promiscuity

I assure you, dear friend, no one has given so much care to the study of composition as I. There is scarcely a famous master in music whose works I have not frequently and diligently studied.

—Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Paul Cézanne, one of the most rebellious and original artists of the modern era, admonished, “We must not be content to memorize the beautiful formulas of our illustrious predecessors.” Indeed, he was not and did not, and thus earned the admiration of generations of artists. Henri Matisse went so far as to refer to Cézanne as “a sort of God of painting,” and Pablo Picasso called Cézanne his “one and only master” and “the father of us all.” Cézanne himself, in his formative years, was influenced heavily by impressionist ...