Paul Gauguin

Paul Gauguin , 1848-1903, French painter and woodcut artist, b. Paris; son of a journalist and a French-Peruvian mother.

Early Life

Gauguin was first a sailor, then a successful stockbroker in Paris. In 1874 he began to paint on weekends. By the age of 35, with the encouragement of Camille Pissarro, he devoted himself completely to his art, having given up his position and separated (1885) from his wife and five children. Allying himself with the Impressionists, he exhibited with them from 1879 to 1886. The next year he sailed for Panama and Martinique. In protest against the "disease" of civilization, he determined to live primitively, but illness forced him to return to France. The next years were spent in Paris and Brittany, with a brief but tragic stay with Van Gogh at Arles.

Later Life and Art

In 1888, Gauguin and Émile Bernard proposed a synthetist theory of art, emphasizing the use of flat planes and bright, nonnaturalistic color in conjunction with symbolic or primitive subjects. The Yellow Christ (Albright-Knox Art Gall., Buffalo) is characteristic of this period. In 1891, Gauguin sold 30 canvases and with the proceeds went to Tahiti. There he spent two years living poorly, painting some of his finest pictures, and writing Noa Noa (tr. 1947), an autobiographical novel set in Tahiti. In 1893 he returned to France, collected a legacy, and exhibited his work, rousing some interest but making very little money. Disheartened and sick from syphilis, which had afflicted him for many years, he again set out for the South Seas in 1895. There his last years were spent in poverty, despair, and physical suffering. In 1897 he attempted suicide and failed, living to paint for five more years. He died on Hiva Oa in the Marquesas Islands.

Gauguin's Style and Impact on Modern Art

Today Gauguin is recognized as a highly influential founding father of modern art. He rejected the tradition of western naturalism, using nature as a starting point from which to abstract figures and symbols. He stressed linear patterns and remarkable color harmonies, imbuing his paintings with a profound sense of mystery. He revived the art of woodcutting with his free and daring knife work and his expressive, irregular shapes and strong contrasts. He produced some fine lithographs and a number of pottery pieces.

There are major examples of Gauguin's work in the United States, including The Day of the God (Art Inst., Chicago), Ia Orana Maria (1891; Metropolitan Mus.), By the Sea (1892; National Gall., Washington, D.C.), and his masterpiece Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going? (1897; Mus. of Fine Arts, Boston). W. Somerset Maugham's Moon and Sixpence (1919), based loosely on the life of Gauguin, did much to promote the Gauguin legend that arose shortly after his death.



See his letters ed. by M. Malingue (tr. 1949); his intimate journals tr. by V. W. Brooks (1958); P. Gauguin, My Father, Paul Gauguin (tr. 1937); D. Sweetman, Paul Gauguin: A Complete Life (1995); M. M. Mathews, Paul Gauguin: An Erotic Life (2001); studies by R. J. Goldwater (1957), B. Danielsson (tr. 1965), and W. Andersen (1971).

Gauguin, Paul (1848–1903). French Post-Impressionist painter, sculptor, and printmaker, born in Paris, the son of a journalist from Orleans and a Peruvian Creole mother. He was one of the giants of 19th-century art and a profound and enduring influence on 20th-century art. In 1883 he gave up a successful career as a stockbroker to devote himself to painting (previously a spare-time occupation for him) and in 1886 he abandoned his family, spending much of the next five years at Pont-Aven in Brittany, where he became the pivot of a group of artists who were attracted by his powerful personality and stimulating ideas about art. In 1887–8 he visited Panama and Martinique, and in 1891 he left France for Tahiti. Apart from two years in 1893–5 when ill-health and poverty forced him back to France, he spent the rest of his life in the South Seas, where he said ‘I have escaped everything that is artificial and conventional. Here I enter into Truth, become one with nature. After the disease of civilization, life in this new world is a return to health.’ His theory and practice of art reflected these attitudes. He was one of the first to find visual inspiration in the arts of ancient or primitive peoples (see PRIMITIVISM), and he reacted vigorously against the naturalism of the Impressionists and the scientific preoccupations of the Neo-Impressionists. As well as using colour unnaturalistically for its decorative or emotional effect, he employed emphatic outlines forming rhythmic patterns suggestive of Japanese colour prints or stained glass. Gauguin also did woodcuts in which the black-and-white areas formed almost abstract patterns and the tool marks were incorporated as parts of the design. Along with those of Edvard Munch, these prints played an important part in stimulating the major revival of the art of woodcut in the 20th century. Gauguin's other work included woodcarving and pottery.

In spite of ill-health (he had syphilis) and lack of money, Gauguin painted his finest pictures in Tahiti. His colours became more resonant, his drawing more grandly simplified, and his expression of the mysteries of life more profound. He was often unable to obtain proper materials and was forced to spread his paint thinly on coarse sacking, but from these limitations he forged a style of rough vigour wholly appropriate to the boldness of his vision. In 1897 he painted his largest and most famous picture, an allegory of life entitled Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going To? (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston), before attempting suicide (although he had deserted his family he had been devastated that year by the news of the death of his favourite daughter). In September 1901 he settled at Dominica in the Marquesas Islands, where he died two years later. ‘Having fallen out with the local bishop, he was denied a Christian burial, and because some of his works were deemed indecent they were burned. The inventory of his remaining effects which were sold at auction reveals his colonial life to have been by no means as impoverished or primitive as he liked to maintain’ ( Belinda Thomson, Gauguin, 1987).

Gauguin was not forgotten in France during his years in the South Seas, but at the time of his death few would have agreed with his self-assessment: ‘I am a great artist and I know it. It is because I am that I have endured such suffering.’ His reputation was firmly established, however, when 227 of his works were shown at the Salon d'Automne in Paris in 1906: ‘For a whole new generation of young artists in Paris, such as Henri Matisse, André Derain and Raoul Dufy, this comprehensive survey of Gauguin's achievements could not have been better timed. Their enthusiasm for his bold, unnaturalistic use of colour and decorative simplicity fully justified Gauguin's confident prediction that his work in itself was less important than its consequences would be: the liberation of the next generation from the trammels of naturalism … [His] introduction of exotic, “primitive” elements into the stylistic and iconographic repertoire … has proved an equally enduring aspect of his legacy to the artists of the twentieth century’ ( Thomson). Because of the romantic appeal of his personality, particularly his willingness to sacrifice everything for his art, Gauguin (like his friend van Gogh) has also been an inspiration for popular and fictional biography, including the novel The Moon and Sixpence (1919) by Somerset Maugham, and the opera of the same title (1957) by John L. Gardner.

Gauguin, Paul (1848–1903). French Post-Impressionist painter, printmaker, sculptor, and ceramicist, born in Paris, the son of a journalist from Orléans and a Peruvian Creole mother. He spent his childhood in Lima, joined the merchant marine in 1865, and from 1872 worked successfully as a stockbroker. In the early 1870s he became a keen amateur painter and in 1874 he saw the first Impressionist exhibition. At about the same time he met Pissarro, who encouraged him, and began to make a collection of Impressionist pictures. He had a landscape accepted by the Salon in 1876 and his work was shown in the fifth to eighth (and last) Impressionist exhibitions (1880–6). In 1883 he gave up his employment to become a full-time artist, but had little success and sold his collection to support himself and his family. After the last Impressionist exhibition he moved to Brittany, abandoning his family, and until 1890 he spent much of his time at Pont-Aven, where he became the pivot of a group of artists who were attracted by his powerful personality and stimulating ideas about art. The most important work he produced there was The Vision after the Sermon, also known as Jacob Wrestling with the Angel (1888, NG, Edinburgh), in which he broke away completely from the Impressionist style, using areas of pure, flat colour for expressive and symbolic purposes. In 1887–8 he visited Panama and Martinique, and in 1888 he spent a short time at Arles with van Gogh, a visit that ended in a disastrous quarrel as van Gogh suffered one of his first attacks of madness.

Gauguin had had a taste for colourful, exotic places since his childhood in Peru and in 1891 he left France for Tahiti. In the account he wrote of his life there, Noa Noa (1st pub. 1897), he said: ‘I have escaped everything that is artificial and conventional. Here I enter into Truth, become one with nature. After the disease of civilization, life in this new world is a return to health.’ His theory and practice of art reflected these attitudes. He was one of the first to find visual inspiration in the arts of ancient or primitive peoples (see Primitivism), and he reacted vigorously against the naturalism of the Impressionists and the scientific preoccupations of the Neo-Impressionists. As well as using colour unnaturalistically for its decorative or emotional effect, he employed emphatic outlines forming rhythmic patterns suggestive of stained glass or Japanese colour prints (see Ukiyo-e). Gauguin also produced woodcuts in which the black and white areas formed almost abstract patterns and the tool marks were incorporated as parts of the design. Along with those of Edvard Munch, these prints played an important part in stimulating the major revival of the art of woodcut in the 20th century. Gauguin's other work included woodcarving and pottery. In Tahiti he endeavoured to ‘go native’ and despite the constant pressure of poverty he painted his finest pictures there. His colours became more resonant, his drawing more grandly simplified, and his expression of the mysteries of life more profound. In 1893 poverty and ill health forced him to return to France, but he had a financial windfall when an uncle died and he was back in Tahiti in 1895. At the end of 1897 he painted his largest and most famous picture, the allegory of life Where Do We Come From? Who Are We? Where Are We Going? (MFA, Boston), before attempting suicide (although he had deserted his family he had been devastated that year by the news of the death of his favourite daughter). In September 1901 he settled at Dominica in the Marquesas Islands, where he died two years later. Until his death he worked continuously in the face of poverty, illness (he had syphilis), and lack of recognition. During his time in the South Seas he was often unable to obtain proper materials and was forced to spread his colours thinly on coarse sacking, but from these limitations he forged a style of rough vigour wholly appropriate to the boldness of his vision.

Gauguin was by no means forgotten in France during his years in the South Seas, but at the time of his death few would have agreed with his self-assessment: ‘I am a great artist and I know it. It is because I am that I have endured such suffering.’ His reputation was firmly established, however, when 227 of his works were shown at the Salon d'Automne in Paris in 1906, and his influence has been enormous. The Nabis were formed under his inspiration, he was a leading figure of the Symbolist movement and one of the sources for Fauvism. Later, he was one of the major influences on the general non-naturalistic trend of 20th-century art. Because of the romantic appeal of his life and personality, particularly his willingness to sacrifice everything for his art, Gauguin (like his friend van Gogh) has also been an inspiration for popular and fictional biography, including the novel The Moon and Sixpence (1919) by Somerset Maugham, and the opera (1957) of the same title by John L. Gardner.