Pierrot and Harlequin is a masterpiece from Cézanne’s brush. The masquerade theme launches reflections about an artist’s fate in the widest sense. Models for the energetic Harlequin and melancholic Pierrot were the artist’s son Paul and his friend Louis Guillaume. Despite the usage of prototypes, this painting is far removed from the traditional tasks of the portrait genre or costume motif. Turning his attention to Carnival heroes – the energetic Harlequin and melancholic, dreamy Pierrot – Cézanne does not just compare the two characters and temperaments. Rather, he mostly shifts the focus to the creative idea of the painting, which turns the motif into an embodiment of a “second” artistic reality. The figures form a plastic contrast, which is expressed with an exceptional pictorial strength. The composition is arranged in such a way that it compares the tough texture of Harlequin’s figure wearing tights with the fragility of Pierrot’s plaster-like garment. This provides the invariable materiality of the volumes that the artist conveys through color with an almost tangible cogency. This theme is unique in Cézanne’s work, and its innovative interpretation had enormous influence on subsequent generations of artists.