Boy In A Red Vest

In the work Boy In A Red Vest, the boy’s image fills the whole painting. His arched body constitutes a major whole composition. This image is firmly located in a compact space structure –the left is limited by the curtain lines, the top is framed by the horizontal lines on the wall and the right is limited by the deep colors of the triangle. The curved arms and curved body are coordinated. The whole painting’s shape, color, point, line and other factors are made according to the rational order some. In order to obtain the safety and harmony of the painting’s structure, the painter deliberately changes the image and proportion of objects.
color block arrangement have great originality. Even the child’s forehead’s white flash is not casually created; that piece of square paper under the juvenile’s left elbow plays a decisive role in the painting. If we will block it, the painting will lose balance and luster.

Boy In A Red Vest
Boy In A Red Vest

Paul Cezanne once took an Italian youth named Lucid Michelangelo as a model and made different oil portraits from four angles. And this painting takes three fourths sides, which is one of the most successful and most famous pieces. In this painting, the character’s head leans on the bending of the left arm, and right arm is free to hang on the legs. Such posture is quite similar to the human postures in German painter Durer’s print Melancholy. Perhaps, this posture itself is with some sad means. This posture has appeared in Cezanne’s later other portraits, such as Smoking Man, Italian Girl, etc.