Matisse saw in Cézanne a supreme example of what a painter could do from a concentrated interrogation of his everyday space. Cézanne’s most successful paintings more often than not derive from his observed “everyday” subject matter: namely his landscapes and still-life. His portrait work has frequent examples of unresolved space, within the form of clothing or simply the way the figure situates itself in the whole. The last Bathers paintings, although monumental in scale and ambition fall short of his great mountain-scapes and still-life works as they seem to rely more and more on his own self-acknowledged systems and vernacular. In short he knew he was painting Cézannes. To go further, Cézanne seems to be putting his subject matter ahead of his ability to make content from the ordinary by seeking the loftiness of the classic French theme of figures in a landscape - his beloved Poussin obviously. As impressive as many of these grand works are, they lack the pictorial frisson of his unsurpassed landscapes and still-life paintings. As Clement Greenberg said of Matisse, his most successful works seem to be when he abandons the figure, so too I believe it applies to Cézanne.
When dealing with the neutrality of unpopulated spaces, the simple rooms, table tops, window views and enclosing walls Matisse is able to afford his visionary imagination greater office and provide his colour pyrotechnics with a greater heft of decision-making. Put a person in there and issues of personality and psychology naturally ensue, muddying the perceptive waters and causing too great a magnetic force for space to oscillate around. A figure creates such a focus as it is so personal a known form that all other parts resort to facilitators of depth rather than makers of space. The difference between these two terms (depth and space) is pivotal in understanding the true achievement of both Matisse and Cézanne. As an aside when thinking about the pictorial disruptions of a figure in a “colour content” painting, witness how Bonnard - a highly sophisticated painter - would often relegate his figures into the periphery of the shadows or render them in more cursory ways to prevent them from breaking the logic of the rest of the painting. He fused them with an Impressionist touch, also; a touch which he never shook off and as such stymied his own elevation to the pantheon of the great painters.
To return to Matisse, he used his instinctive doubt of how he perceived space to positive effect. A seeing hesitancy was simply the natural consequences of one who works solely from observation (as did Cézanne - Bathers aside!) Matisse also learned something crucial from Cézanne. Unlike Picasso and Braque who had focused on the look of Cézanne as their own departure point, Matisse sought the principles of Cézanne, hence his famous dictum, “If Cézanne is right, I am right” In doing so Matisse understood the sight itself is unstable. Forms cannot be fixed in the traditional perspectival system derived from Renaissance art. That may control the space, set it down as a convincing illusion of our world, but it is a static world - a depth world. Renaissance artists inherently knew this limitation so they deposed their figures in ever more exaggerated poses, twists and torsions to offer a more dynamic moving sense of space - depth space though for all forms and background (for it is a background) are rendered with a tonal system which gives the works an overall greyness.
Matisse moved his head - as we do - and was true to this experience when painting. When this happens forms are no longer fixable. Such animation lends itself to the potentials of colour. Colour is equally unstable. Colour is sight. Tones, for example, are simply shades of one colour. How we perceive space is a mystery as we are perpetually building our sight-realities at light speed. Slow these down and an infinite sequence of snap shots (akin to the saccading of our eyes) would reveal differences of scene - from the minuscule to the abrupt shunting in of the peripheral( not to mention feelings and memories all buzzing along the visual cortex superhighways. Such oscillations would cause multiplicities and distortions. In Matisse’s paintings these variances reveal themselves through the visual qualities: density, brushstroke, sgraffito (adding huge scale changes of visual data) layering, cropping, transparency, direction of line, weight and so on, all conveyed in a richness of surface colour like no other painter produced. All this inventive variety provides the eyes with an accord of its true perceptions of space. Note an accord not an imitation. As Cézanne said “I am seeking reality parallel with nature”.
It is better to use the word space rather than depth, also when discussing Matisse (or Cézanne) Depth is systematic, it can be choreographed. Space is chaotic, it pivots on movement. In painting, I believe “difference” (contrast in its widest definition) can induce eye movement. How difference is manifest is a moot point. All of the above from Matisse of course, plus temperatures, scales changes and numerous others - let’s not forget surprise, also. The challenge for the abstract painter is to harness difference to build space. We have to get movement into our work. If not working from a motif or relying on a format, the ground becomes less solid. Abstraction is a dead end as it can be followed back to the motif like a string in the woods. For true invention with meaning and significance, movement is key. Movement begins with the ambition of the artist. Looking at the paintings of Matisse and Cézanne fuels that ambition further.