Painters and Saint-Tropez.

In painting, evoking the Mediterranean coastline most often means referring to L'Estaque with Cézanne, to Collioures with Matisse and Derain, as if these places had somehow confiscated the entire contribution of coastal Provence to 20th-century art. And yet, Saint-Tropez and its inimitable peninsula are also, as Pierre Bonnard so aptly noted, "a synthesis of Provence." When Signac landed there in 1892 aboard his yacht, the Olympia, he was struck by the quality of its light and fascinated by the harmony of its landscapes. He brought his friends, Matisse, Bonnard, Luce, Manguin, Person and many others, who all, in their own way, would contribute to the renewal of modern art. Michel Ipas invites us to the story of this exceptional pictorial epic, reinventing through text and rare iconography a crucial moment in French art.