AUSTRALIA.- Richard Finnila of the Herald Sun reported that now two of the world’s leading experts of Paul Cezanne scholarship have branded a painting stolen from northern New South Wales last week a fake. The great-grandson of Paul Cezanne, after inspecting a copy of the suspect painting, said it could not possibly be a genuine Cezanne because it did not have the "composition, the brush or spirit of the artist". Speaking from his home in France yesterday, Philippe Cezanne, 63, said his great-grandfather completed some paintings and sketches of his son, but he didn’t know of any in a highchair. 

Artist John Opit lost what he described as a $50 million painting said to be Paul Cezanne’s Son in a High Chair among a haul of 20 artworks stolen at the same time. "This painting has his mark on it," Mr. Opit said last week. Philippe is the grandson of Paul Cezanne’s only child, who is also named Paul. Paul Cezanne Jr. was born in Paris in 1872 - one year before the painting is alleged to have been done.

Philippe said Paul Cezanne was living near Paris in 1873 with his partner Hortense, who later became his wife. He said he knew of a handful of paintings that Paul Cezanne did of his son when he was a baby, but believed them all to be in museums rather than private collections. Philippe Cezanne is the President of the Societe Paul Cezanne, which is an international organization made up of the world’s 20 leading Cezanne scholars. The elite art society investigates newly discovered works by Cezanne and decides if they are worthy of inclusion in the official Paul Cezanne Catalogue Raisonne.

There have been only two new works added to the official Catalogue Raisonne since it was published in 1996. The Catalogue Raisonne was the life work of the world’s leading Cezanne scholar, John Rewald. It was published two years after Rewald’s death with the help of New York art historian and vice-president of the Societe Paul Cezanne, Jayne Warman. After inspecting a copy of the painting yesterday, Ms Warman said she was convinced that it could not be a Cezanne. "In my opinion it’s not a painting by Cezanne. I’ve never seen it before and I don’t think that John Rewald certainly ever saw it," she said.

"It certainly doesn’t have any stylistic characteristics of the paintings that Cezanne was doing at the time. Ms Warman said Cezanne mainly did drawings of his son rather than paintings, and more particularly, knew most of the drawings to be of his son’s head or of him sleeping. All attempts to contact John Opit by phone yesterday failed.