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Gauguin

20
Availability: May 3, 2024
Before he was painting nudes on Tahitian beaches, Paul Gauguin was a sailor, a salesman in Copenhagen, and a stockbroker in Paris. A leading influence in the post-Impressionist avant-garde, Gauguin settled in the Pacific in search of an unspoiled paradise and in rejection of “artificial” life in Europe. His vivid life story is matched only by his astonishingly bold paintings and masterful acts of color.
Hardcover8.3 x 10.2 in.1.37 lb96 pages
Gauguin

Gauguin

20

Destination Exotic

Paul Gauguin’s Pacific visions radiate with color and sunshine

Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) was not cut out for finance. Nor did he last particularly long in the French Navy, or as a tarpaulin salesman in Copenhagen who did not speak Danish. He began painting in his spare time in 1873 and in 1876 took part in the Paris Salon. Three years later, he was exhibiting alongside Pissarro, Degas, and Monet.

A querulous, hard-drinking individual, Gauguin often called himself a savage. His close but fraught friendship with the similarly temperamental Vincent van Gogh climaxed in a violent incident in 1888, when van Gogh purportedly confronted Gauguin with a razor blade, and later cut off his own ear. Shortly afterwards, following the completion of a midcareer masterpiece Vision After the Sermon (1888), Gauguin took himself to Tahiti, with the intention of escaping “everything that is artificial and conventional…”

On Tahiti, Gauguin’s unfettered joy in the island’s nature, native people, and figurative images soared, spurring a prolific output of paintings and prints. In works such as Woman with a Flower (Vahine no te Tiare, 1891) and Sacred Spring: Sweet Dreams (Nave Nave Moe, 1894), he developed a distinct, Primitivist style that positively oozed with sunshine and color. In the tradition of exotic sensuality, his thick, buttery lashings of paint lingered in particular over the curves of Tahitian women.

Gauguin died alone, on Tahiti’s neighboring Marquesas Islands, with many of his personal papers and belongings dispersed in a local auction. It was not until a smart art dealer began curating and showing Gauguin’s work in Paris that the artist’s profound influence began making itself felt, especially to the new breed of French avant-garde artists, such as Picasso and Matisse.This book offers the essential introduction the artist’s truly colorful life, from the Impressionist salons of 1870s Paris to his final days in the Pacific, productive and passionate to the end.
The author

Ingo F. Walther (1940–2007) was born in Berlin and studied medieval studies, literature, and art history in Frankfurt am Main and Munich. He published numerous books on the art of the Middle Ages and of the 19th and 20th centuries. Walther’s many titles for TASCHEN include Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, Art of the 20th Century, and Codices illustres.

Gauguin
Hardcover21 x 26 cm0.62 kg96 pages

ISBN 978-3-8365-3222-8

Edition: French

ISBN 978-3-8365-3223-5

Edition: English

ISBN 978-3-8365-6472-4

Edition: Spanish
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Exhibition

September 08, 2024 - January 19, 2025

Paris 1874: The Impressionist Moment

National Gallery of Art, Washington DC, United States

Exhibition

October 03, 2024 - January 19, 2025

Paul Gauguin

Kunstforum, Vienna, Austria

Born back in 1985, the Basic Art Series has evolved into the best-selling art book collection ever published. Each book in TASCHEN’s Basic Art series features:
• a detailed chronological summary of the life and oeuvre of the artist, covering his or her cultural and historical importance
• a concise biography
• approximately 100 illustrations with explanatory captions

4

/5

2 Ratings

Bien

Augustin,October 27, 2021
Bon ouvrage d'introduction sur ce grand peintre

Bien

Augustin,October 27, 2021
Bon ouvrage d'introduction sur ce grand peintre