The influence of Cézanne on the aesthetic perception of the female body in the art of Adalbert Erdeli

DOI: https://doi.org/10.17721/1728-2640.2025.161.7

Abstract

Background. The article examines the influence of Paul Cézanne’s plastic language on the artistic thinking of Adalbert Erdeli and the formation of the aesthetic foundations of the Transcarpathian School of Painting. It explores how Cézanne’s principles of constructive comprehension of form, color, and space acquired new resonance within the local context of interwar art. The research focuses on the ways in which Erdeli interpreted and transformed Cézanne’s model of artistic vision, combining it with national motifs of identity and his own philosophical perception of nature and the human being.

Methods. The study employs a historical-comparative approach, which makes it possible to trace the evolution of artistic thinking from Cézanne’s constructive principles to Erdeli’s individual painterly system. Formal and stylistic analysis is used to reveal the compositional structures, chromatic solutions, and spatial treatment in the works of both artists. The iconographic method enables the identification of specific features in the representation of the female body and the motif of the bathers – one of the central themes within Cézanne’s and post-Cézannean explorations. A semiotic approach reveals the underlying semantic structures in Erdeli’s oeuvre, where the image of the nude figure becomes not merely an object of formal experimentation but also a symbol of spiritual harmony and the unity of humanity and nature. Hermeneutic analysis provides the framework for interpreting artistic works in the broader cultural and philosophical paradigms of European modernism, which were transformed within the specific environment of Transcarpathian art.

Results. Adalbert Erdeli’s oeuvre demonstrates a consistent rethinking of Cézanne’s concept of constructive painting. Works such as Nude on the Shore, Bathers, and Trio illustrate the artist’s aspiration toward the harmonization of volumetric-spatial structures, the monumentalization of the human figure, and the synthesis of color masses into a unified rhythmic whole. His unique double-sided painting Nude on the Shore / Bathers serves as an example of the artist’s inner dialogue with tradition – a kind of plastic diary reflecting the stages of his formal exploration and philosophical evolution. In his treatment of the human body, Erdeli, like Cézanne, sought to transcend naturalistic resemblance, transforming form into an expression of spiritual state and structural unity of the world.

Conclusions. Paul Cézanne’s influence on Adalbert Erdeli’s artistic system is manifested not through direct quotations or imitation but through a profound reception of his methodology of vision. Erdeli reinterpreted Cézanne’s logic of form construction, chromatic analysis, and structural organization of space according to his own aesthetic objectives. Through this creative transformation, post-Cézannean principles in Erdeli’s painting acquired emotional depth, national coloration, and philosophical intensity. Thus, dialogue with Cézanne became one of the key factors in the formation of modern artistic thinking in Ukrainian art of the first half of the twentieth century and determined the conceptual foundations of the Transcarpathian School of Painting.

Keywords: Transcarpathian School of Painting, aesthetics, Paul Cézanne, Adalbert Erdélyi, plastic language, constructiveness, colorism, bathers.