Paul Gaugin struggled to achieve success within his life time. Born in Paris, France, to a journalist father Clovis Gauguin and mother Alina Maria Chazal of Peruvian origin, Gaugin saw struggles from a very early age. He lost his father as a mere infant of 18 months when his father voyaged from Paris to Peru to cover the story of politics in Peru. Thereafter the mother took the infant to Peru and lived there for 4 years without financial support to continue a life in Paris. It was here in Lima that the first traces of his colorful art and themes could be traced with the very first sparks of imagination in a child. at the age of 7 years the young boy returned to France to live with grandfather in Orléans where he schooled until the age of 14 when he went to Paris to join a naval preparatory academy. With the death of the mother in 1867 young Gaugin returned to Paris to become a stockbroker. At 23 years of age Gaugin made some early successes on the Paris Bourse and then also as an art dealer on the side. but as the stock market crashed in 1879 so too did his fortunes. In 1879 after having married a Danish woman, Mette-Sophie Gad, Gaugin decided to throw himself into a new career as a painter and where his passion for life could be restored.
As an art dealer Gaugin had the privilege of meeting artists like Pissaro and Cézanne and frequent galleries to spot emerging artistic talent. Gauguin showed his very own paintings to the world first at the Impressionist exhibitions held in 1881 and 1882. His art was not received well.
In November 1884, for the sake of saving his marriage he moved with his wife Mette-Sophie Gad and children to Copenhagen, Denmark. but their marriage quickly broke down and Gaugin returned to Paris.
In later years Gaugin became deeply distrustful of European impressionism and searched for deeper hidden meanings within the arts of Africa and Asia. His use of color broke new grounds from the Impressionist movement starting to stifle and grow dull. Gaugin experimented with Medieval enameling techniques known as Cloisonnist work, which saw the abandoning of subtle gradations of color with bold outlines. As a French post-impressionist Gaugin
only became truly noticeable after his death for his fascinating use of
color and synthesis which began to set the artist apart from the
mainstream school of Impressionism. Avante garde contemporary French
artists like Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse became fascinated with
Gaugin's style of palette. Such experimentation with color led to the
creation of what is know today as the 'synthetist' style of modern art.
Synthetist artists aimed to synthesize these three important features:
1. The outward appearance of natural forms.
2. The artist’s feelings about their subject.
3. The purity of the aesthetic considerations of line, colour and form.
1. The outward appearance of natural forms.
2. The artist’s feelings about their subject.
3. The purity of the aesthetic considerations of line, colour and form.
Paul Gaugin - photograph c. 1891.
In 1887 Gaugin visited Martinique where he traveled amongst the rural poor, composing paintings and learned to rediscover the bright charms of Latin America. the works composed during this sojourn became deeply admired by Vincent Van Gogh. Back home in France the two artists became friends and then spent 9 weeks together painting in the town of Arles and living together in a rented house. but their relationship broke down and after a heated argument where Gaugin declared that he was leaving, Van Gogh famously cut his own ear off in anger! In 1891 Gaugin went to the Polynesian island of Tahiti where he lived in a bamboo hut and thence produced some of his finest works including the work Nafea Faa Ipoipo (When Will You Marry?). In 1893 Gaugin returned to Paris but soon became lost within his own city of birth and decided to return to Tahiti in 1895 where over the next 6 years he produced many paintings and wood carvings. Gaugin died in French Polynesia in 1903 at the early age of 54 years.
Reflections upon fine art by Pieter Bergli
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