Just outside the centre, the Atelier des Lauves brings the artist’s world into sharper focus. Cézanne worked here during the final years of his life, and the studio still contains his furniture, painting materials and objects that appeared in his late still lifes.

Further into the countryside, the landscapes themselves become part of the story. At the Bibémus quarries, ochre rock, pine trees and sharply defined forms reveal some of the scenery that influenced Cézanne’s increasingly geometric approach to painting.

And above it all is Mont Sainte-Victoire. Cézanne painted the mountain repeatedly, returning to the same subject from different viewpoints and in changing light. Once you have seen it from the roads and hills around Aix, it becomes easy to understand why this single landscape could occupy him for so long.