Cezanne's city of Aix in France is a culture- packed dream for

DARRYL WEBBER

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PRETTY squares, golden light, labyrinthine streets and colourful markets - you can see why Paul Cezanne was so besotted with his home city of Aix-en-Provence.

For the French father of Post-Impressionism, Aix and the surrounding countryside were an inspiration throughout his life.

But the love affair was somewhat one-way in his lifetime. While Cezanne was establishing himself as a key player in the Impressionist movement of the late 19th century, and then as a radical artist on his own terms, he was largely unappreciated in his home town.

While Picasso acknowledged Cezanne as the father of modern art, Henri Pontier, the curator of Aix's Musee Granet, famously declared in 1900: "No Cezanne will ever enter the museum as long as I live." How times change.

The Musee Granet is central to Aix's celebration of Cezanne this year with a major exhibition of his work on until October 12, the greatest gathering of his paintings in his home city since he was alive. That's just one of many events and attractions marking the summer of Cezanne in Aix.

The Cezanne family home from 1859-1899, Jas de Bouffan, is in the midst of a grand restoration and now the public can get a sense of how the house and gardens inspired the son of a wealthy banker to become a pioneering artist. When we visited Jas de Bouffan, it was still a work in progress but Denis Coutagne, the president of the Cezanne Society and a former curator of the Musee Granet, explained to us just how important this place was to Cezanne's decision to be an artist.

The house is in the city now but in Cezanne's time it would have been on its outskirts, looking over the surrounding countryside with views of Mont Sainte-Victoire, a subject of constant fascination for Cezanne - he painted or drew it dozens of times throughout his life.