Afternoon in Naples by Paul Cezanne.The theme of this painting recurs in Cézanne's early work. It probably first appeared in two works which Cézanne submitted to the Salon in 1867, which were rejected for exhibition (present whereabouts unknown). The critic Arnold Mortier's description of the second, bawdier, painting corresponds to a drawing, a watercolour and a tiny oil sketch which are generally thought to have been executed between 1862 and 1867. These works have all the ingredients of the later Afternoon in Naples - the female nude sprawled on the nude man who nonchalantly lies on his stomach smoking a pipe, while a maid enters with refreshments.According to Ambroise Vollard, the title L'Aprés-midi à Naples was suggested to Cézanne by his painter friend Antoine Guillemet. As Theodore Reff has noted, the title alludes 'to the popular notion of Italy as a place of freedom, of sensual life and gaiety'.