Paul Gauguin: A Tahitian Painting

Paper Summary:

This paper discusses Paul Gauguin's Tahitian paintings, focusing particularly on his work "Whence Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?". The paper explains that Gauguin's Tahitian paintings celebrate the mysteriousness and unique beauty of his new land, but are rarely accurate pictures of Tahitian life. The paper then describes this individual painting, its meaning and comments by art critics. The overall message of the painting, the author concludes, is that every person continues on the path of life, taking turns going through each phase in the eternally rotating life cycle. The paper uses footnotes instead of a bibliography.

From the Paper:

"Although Gauguin's painting poses three questions "Whence Do We Come? What Are We? Where Are We Going?", it ultimately asks a single intimate question that has continued to plague mankind: what is our purpose? This is an important aspect of his painting: it asks the questions, rather than answering them. Because of this united meaning behind all three questions, it would be impossible to contemplate one question without somehow touching upon the other two."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Herbert Read, A Concise History of Modern Painting, (New York, NY: Thames & Hudson Inc, 1985).
• Robert Goldwater, Primitivism in Modern Art, (Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1987).
• Alfred H. Barr, Jr., The Nature of Abstract Art, (New York, NY: Museum of Modern Art, 1937).
• Herschel B. Chipp, Theories of Modern Art, (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1968).

More papers on Paul Gauguin: A Tahitian Painting:

• Analytical Essay # 90538 : "'Paul Robeson: A Biography'"
• Analytical Essay # 123255 : "Woolf, Gauguin, DuBois and Sociology"
• Descriptive Essay # 146953 : "Gauguin: Self Exile from La Belle Epoque"

APA Citation:

MLA Citation: