50 free Paul Cezanne trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Paul Cézanne was rejected by the Salon every year for decades, called a mason with a trowel by Manet, and was chased out of his hometown's good graces by newspaper clippings on his doormat. By the time he died after collapsing in a storm, Matisse and Picasso were calling him the father of them all. These 50 questions cover the life and the work: the banker father and the law degree he did not want, the schoolboy friendship with Zola and the novel that ended it, Pissarro as 'God the Father', the hidden family in L'Estaque, and Vollard's 1895 show that turned a hundredfold price rise. You will get Mont Sainte-Victoire and its railway bridge, the five Card Players and the Qatar record, the Philadelphia Bathers and the gap in the studio wall, the palette-knife couillardes, the Four Seasons signed 'Ingres', and the Salon trick that got him hung once. Easy questions cover Aix, Post-Impressionism and cylinders; the hard tier asks about Chocquet's letter, Henri Rochefort, uncle Dominique and the Cincinnati X-ray. Every answer is cited to a page we checked, with a short explanation so you learn something even when you miss.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which Provençal town was Cézanne born in 1839?
Aix-en-Provence
He was born at 28 rue de l'Opéra and was buried in the town's Saint-Pierre Cemetery.
Q 02Which art movement is Cézanne usually filed under?
Post-Impressionism
His work is called the bridge between Impressionism and Cubism.
Q 03Which mountain near Aix did Cézanne paint around eighty times?
Mont Sainte-Victoire
He first praised it as a 'beau motif' after seeing it from the new Aix–Marseille railway.
Q 04Which famous novelist was Cézanne's schoolfriend in Aix?
Émile Zola
With Baptistin Baille they were 'Les Trois Inséparables', swimming and fishing in the Arc.
Q 05Which two artists reportedly called Cézanne 'the father of us all'?
Matisse and Picasso
Picasso also said 'he was the only master for me'.
Q 06Which three solids did Cézanne say nature should be treated in terms of?
Cylinder, sphere and cone
The 1904 letter to Émile Bernard became a Cubist touchstone.
Q 07What was Cézanne's father's profession?
Banker
Louis-Auguste co-founded Banque Cézanne et Cabassol and left his son 400,000 francs.
Q 08What was the name of the family estate outside Aix that Cézanne painted for decades?
Jas de Bouffan
His father bought the 'House of the Wind' in 1859; Cézanne painted four-season murals in its salon.
Q 09Whose name did Cézanne ironically sign on his Four Seasons murals of 1860?
Ingres
He disliked Ingres and dated the winter panel 1811, a nod to Jupiter and Thetis.
Q 10What did Cézanne study at university in Aix at his father's insistence?
Law
He neglected it for drawing classes at the Musée Granet and left for Paris in 1861.
Q 11Which Paris academy accepted Cézanne after the École des Beaux-Arts turned him down?
Académie Suisse
There he met Pissarro, ten years his senior, and fellow Aixois Achille Emperaire.
Q 12Which older painter did Cézanne call 'God the Father' and claim as his master?
Camille Pissarro
Painting together at Pontoise, Pissarro got him to drop black for the three primaries.
Q 13Who was the bookbinder's assistant Cézanne met in 1869 and married in 1886?
Hortense Fiquet
She sat for 26 known portraits despite their broken relationship.
Q 21Which 1886 Zola novel about a failed painter who kills himself wounded Cézanne?
L'Œuvre
Claude Lantier's story hurt Cézanne; a 1887 letter shows the friendship survived a while longer.
Q 22Why did Cézanne finally marry Hortense in 1886, by the biography's account?
To legitimise their son Paul
He was terrified of being touched after a childhood kick on the stairs; the marriage was not for love.
Q 23Which dealer gave Cézanne his first solo exhibition in Paris in 1895?
Ambroise Vollard
He showed 50 of about 150 works Cézanne sent him in a package; Monet was the first buyer.
Q 14In which fishing village near Marseille did Cézanne sit out the Franco-Prussian War?
L'Estaque
He was denounced as a deserter in 1871 but never caught; he painted its bay for years.
Q 15Which doctor, later Van Gogh's physician, lent Cézanne his studio at Auvers-sur-Oise?
Paul Gachet
Gachet was an ambitious hobby painter himself.
Q 16What did Manet call Cézanne when refusing to show with him in 1874?
A mason who paints with a trowel
Pissarro had to push through Cézanne's inclusion in the first Impressionist exhibition.
Q 17Which 1863 Manet painting did Cézanne 'quote' in a more drastic 1874 version?
Olympia
Cézanne added the suitor, thought to be a self-portrait, to the prostitute and servant.
Q 18Which Cézanne painting sold for 300 francs to Count Doria at the first Impressionist show?
The Hanged Man's House
The exhibition lost over 180 francs per participating artist.
Q 19Which customs inspector became Cézanne's most loyal collector from 1875?
Victor Chocquet
Critic Louis Leroy said his portrait, 'the colour of an old boot', might give a pregnant woman a shock.
Q 20Whose thoughtless letter revealed Cézanne's secret family to his father in 1878?
Victor Chocquet's
His father halved the monthly allowance before relenting with 400 francs.
Q 24Which painter first bought a Cézanne painting, per the biography?
Monet
Degas, Renoir and Pissarro followed; prices rose a hundredfold.
Q 25Which painter did Cézanne accuse of stealing his 'little sensation'?
Paul Gauguin
They had worked together at Pontoise in 1881; Cézanne said Gauguin only painted chinoiseries.
Q 26How many paintings make up The Card Players series?
Five
The models were farmhands from the Jas de Bouffan; a Le Nain in the Aix museum inspired the theme.
Q 27Who bought a version of The Card Players in 2011 for an estimated $250 million?
Qatar's royal family
It set a record for any painting that stood until November 2017.
Q 28Which London institution shows a two-player Card Players beside its study Man with a Pipe?
Courtauld
It co-curated a 2010–11 show of the series with the Metropolitan Museum.
Q 29Which city's museum owns the largest Bathers, 208 by 249 cm?
Philadelphia
Leo Stein once owned it; Joseph Widener's trust paid $110,000 in 1937.
Q 30For how many years did Cézanne work on the largest Bathers, leaving it unfinished?
Seven
He built a long narrow gap in his Les Lauves studio wall to move large canvases out.