GENERAL DESCRIPTION
In his mid-thirties, Paul Gauguin abandoned his life as a stockbroker to become an artist. He sought to escape the constraints of industrialized society and dreamed of an unspoiled paradise where he could avoid his financial problems. In 1891, more than a decade after his career change, Gauguin pursued this imagined utopia in the French colony of Tahiti. Although the island did not live up to his fantasy, his paintings present Tahiti as a kind of Eden. Here, Gauguin depicted two Tahitian women wearing traditional skirts, standing beneath pandanus trees, a palm-like plant with long, spear-shaped leaves. The fallen foliage appears as ribbons of yellow against the dark red soil, suggesting a kind of mystic writing emanating from a primal, earthen ground.
Excerpt from
Nicole R. Myers, DMA label copy, 2018.
NOTES
Created in 1891
Checked Piction: no audio or video resources to add
TMS done
Other Label copy:
In Tahiti, Gauguin sought an exotic world far from Western civilization, a distant place of brilliant colors, luscious vegetation, and foreign custom. The South Seas provided Gauguin with the distance--both real-and psychological--to pursue his radical aesthetic goals. In this painting, each element speaks to the exotic, even the black dog that lopes at the center of the composition seems to suggest the barbaric qualities Gauguin felt he had discovered in the South Pacific. Gauguin himself clearly prized this paintiing, adopting this imagery in a woodcut and monotype that he used for the frontispiece of his autobiographial account of his journey, Noa Noa.
Dorothy Kosinski, "I Raro te Oviri (Under tha Pandanus)", in Dallas Museum of Art: A Guide to the Collection, ed. Suzanne Kotz (Dallas, TX: Dallas Museum of Art, 1997), 113.
In Tahiti Gauguin sought an exotic world far from Western civilization, a distant place of brilliant colors, luscious vegetation, and foreign custom. There he found both the real and psychological distance to pursue his radical aesthetic goal of an art that does not copy nature. In I Raro te Oviri, Gauguin suppressed spatial illusionism and instead constructed the landscape with horizontal bands of colors which reinforce the two-dimensionality of the canvas. The figures are dressed in pareos, skirts of flowered cotton wrapped around the waist. The red fabric forms a bold contrast to the brilliant green field to the left, a daring manipulation of complementary colors which is repeated in the fruits balanced on the shoulders of the figure at the right. The reddish brown earth bears a calligraphic pattern of undulated yellow—fallen palm leaves—that gives the impression of hot, molten material.
The stiff, wooden stances of the women recall the importance of the Buddhist bas-reliefs at Borobudur in Java (which he knew from photographs) as a specific sources for Gauguin's primitivizing rendering of figures. Even the black dog at the center of the composition seems to transcend mere genre, suggesting the animalistic or barbaric qualities that Gauguin imagined he head discovered in the South Pacific. The deductive aura of the exotic undoubtedly served as a powerful catalyst for Gauguin's bold redefinition of painting. Gauguin clearly prized this painting. He adopted its imagery in a woodcut and for a monotype which he used as the frontispiece to his semi-autobiographical account of his first Tahitian journey, Noa Noa.
Catalogue essays
Artist/designers
Cultures
Geography
Depicted location and place of origin: Tahiti (island): TGN: 7006211
Process/materials
Post-Impressionism
Historical periods
Individuals
Subject terms
RELATED OBJECTS
PROVENANCE
AUDIO ASSETS
VIDEO ASSETS
IMAGE ASSETS
WEB RESOURCES
- Guggenheim, New York~Read a biography of Paul Gauguin from the Guggenheim.
- YouTube~Watch a video of actor Keanu Reeves reading excerpts from Gauguin's Tahitian travel journal Noa Noa.
- The British Museum, London~View a woodcut print made by Paul Gauguin titled Noa Noa (Fragrant Scent).
- Minneapolis Institute of Art~Check out this Tahitian landscape by Gauguin.
- Musée d'Orsay, Paris~This painting is another example of Gauguin's representations of Tahitian women.
- DMA Uncrated~Check out this blog post from the Dallas Museum of Art that examines the conservation of Gauguin's Under the Pandanus.
ARCHIVAL RESOURCES
FUN FACTS
- Paul Gauguin clearly prized this paintiing, adopting this imagery in a woodcut and monotype that he used for the frontispiece of his autobiographial account of his journey to the South Pacific, Noa Noa.
TEACHING IDEAS
RULES
Apply to objects where number equals 1963.58.FA
Category
rules_operator
AND
General Description
In his mid-thirties, Paul Gauguin abandoned his life as a stockbroker to become an artist. He sought to escape the constraints of industrialized society and dreamed of an unspoiled paradise where he could avoid his financial problems. In 1891, more than a decade after his career change, Gauguin pursued this imagined utopia in the French colony of Tahiti. Although the island did not live up to his fantasy, his paintings present Tahiti as a kind of Eden. Here, Gauguin depicted two Tahitian women wearing traditional skirts, standing beneath pandanus trees, a palm-like plant with long, spear-shaped leaves. The fallen foliage appears as ribbons of yellow against the dark red soil, suggesting a kind of mystic writing emanating from a primal, earthen ground.
Excerpt from
Nicole R. Myers, DMA label copy, 2018.
Fun Facts
- Paul Gauguin clearly prized this paintiing, adopting this imagery in a woodcut and monotype that he used for the frontispiece of his autobiographial account of his journey to the South Pacific, Noa Noa.
Archival Resources
Web Resources
- Guggenheim, New York~Read a biography of Paul Gauguin from the Guggenheim.
- YouTube~Watch a video of actor Keanu Reeves reading excerpts from Gauguin's Tahitian travel journal Noa Noa.
- The British Museum, London~View a woodcut print made by Paul Gauguin titled Noa Noa (Fragrant Scent).
- Minneapolis Institute of Art~Check out this Tahitian landscape by Gauguin.
- Musée d'Orsay, Paris~This painting is another example of Gauguin's representations of Tahitian women.
- DMA Uncrated~Check out this blog post from the Dallas Museum of Art that examines the conservation of Gauguin's Under the Pandanus.
Notes
Created in 1891
Checked Piction: no audio or video resources to add
TMS done
Other Label copy:
In Tahiti, Gauguin sought an exotic world far from Western civilization, a distant place of brilliant colors, luscious vegetation, and foreign custom. The South Seas provided Gauguin with the distance--both real-and psychological--to pursue his radical aesthetic goals. In this painting, each element speaks to the exotic, even the black dog that lopes at the center of the composition seems to suggest the barbaric qualities Gauguin felt he had discovered in the South Pacific. Gauguin himself clearly prized this paintiing, adopting this imagery in a woodcut and monotype that he used for the frontispiece of his autobiographial account of his journey, Noa Noa.
Dorothy Kosinski, "I Raro te Oviri (Under tha Pandanus)", in Dallas Museum of Art: A Guide to the Collection, ed. Suzanne Kotz (Dallas, TX: Dallas Museum of Art, 1997), 113.
In Tahiti Gauguin sought an exotic world far from Western civilization, a distant place of brilliant colors, luscious vegetation, and foreign custom. There he found both the real and psychological distance to pursue his radical aesthetic goal of an art that does not copy nature. In I Raro te Oviri, Gauguin suppressed spatial illusionism and instead constructed the landscape with horizontal bands of colors which reinforce the two-dimensionality of the canvas. The figures are dressed in pareos, skirts of flowered cotton wrapped around the waist. The red fabric forms a bold contrast to the brilliant green field to the left, a daring manipulation of complementary colors which is repeated in the fruits balanced on the shoulders of the figure at the right. The reddish brown earth bears a calligraphic pattern of undulated yellow—fallen palm leaves—that gives the impression of hot, molten material.
The stiff, wooden stances of the women recall the importance of the Buddhist bas-reliefs at Borobudur in Java (which he knew from photographs) as a specific sources for Gauguin's primitivizing rendering of figures. Even the black dog at the center of the composition seems to transcend mere genre, suggesting the animalistic or barbaric qualities that Gauguin imagined he head discovered in the South Pacific. The deductive aura of the exotic undoubtedly served as a powerful catalyst for Gauguin's bold redefinition of painting. Gauguin clearly prized this painting. He adopted its imagery in a woodcut and for a monotype which he used as the frontispiece to his semi-autobiographical account of his first Tahitian journey, Noa Noa.
Catalogue essays
Artist/designers
Cultures
Geography
Depicted location and place of origin: Tahiti (island): TGN: 7006211
Process/materials
Post-Impressionism
Historical periods
Individuals
Subject terms
RELATED OBJECTS
PROVENANCE
AUDIO ASSETS
VIDEO ASSETS
rules
Apply To
Objects
number
Equals
1963.58.FA
source file
object_notes_2_d-0390.xml.nores