Cézanne himself noted, according to Joachim Gasquet, that the mountain held some sort of “cosmic” significance for him: “Look at Ste.-Victoire. What élan, what an imperious thirst for the sun, and what melancholy, in the evening, when all this weightiness falls back to earth...These masses were made of fire. Fire is in them still. Both darkness and daylight seem to recoil from them in fear, trembling. There above us is Plato’s cave: see how, as large clouds pass by, the shadow that they ast shudders on the rocks, as if burned, suddenly swallowed by a mouth of fire.” Such statements capture how Cézanne imbues Mont Sainte-Victoire with a sense of urgency and drama, and how he hoped his paintings would be received by viewers. Indeed, this perception has been echoed by critics like Fritz Novotny, who have argued that, in these works, Cézanne gave up real truth to nature. His Mont Sainte-Victoire paintings are simultaneously “timeless” and “quiet” as well as “turbulent” and “ecstatic.” Despite its grand ambitions, this series has “rarely been critically assessed or published,” in the scheme of art history., although it was featured in the 1980 BBC television series 100 Great Paintings. Discovery in Gurlitt trove In 2012, a version of Cézanne's Montagne Sainte-Victoire (Landscape with Mont Sainte-Victoire), 1897 was discovered in the stash of paintings held by the Munich recluse Cornelius Gurlitt. Gallery References External links WebMuseum: Cézanne, Paul: The Mont Sainte-Victoire and Bibemus saga Mont Sainte-Victoire (1902) Mont Sainte-Victoire (1902–1904) (Archived 2009-11-01) Mont Sainte-Victorie by Mark Tansey (1987) Paintings by Paul Cézanne 1880s paintings Paintings in the National Galleries of Scotland