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The Artist's Portfolio, Pont Aven

1894
Not on view
Following his first trip to Tahiti, Gauguin returned to the village of Pont-Aven in Brittany, France, where he had found artistic inspiration early in his career. After fracturing his leg in a brawl, he was unable to stand at his easel long enough to paint and worked instead on drawings and prints, at least some of which he likely kept in this highly personal portfolio. He decorated the inside covers with watercolors of local subjects, including a mill and waterway, a family of geese, and a Cézannesque plate of fresh fruit in a style that recalls the highly simplified, abstracted landscapes of the pre-Tahiti period, with their swiftly rising planes and prominent serpentine lines.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: The Artist's Portfolio, Pont Aven
  • Artist: Paul Gauguin (French, Paris 1848–1903 Atuona, Hiva Oa, Marquesas Islands)
  • Date: 1894
  • Medium: Two inside covers decorated in watercolor and gouache over charcoal with graphite on heavy gray wove (blotting) paper sewn to leather; leather binding inscribed in pen and ink with additions in watercolor; multicolored silk ribbons stitched into binding.
  • Dimensions: each drawing: 16-3/4 x 10-3/8 in. (42.5 x 26.4 cm)
  • Classification: Drawings
  • Credit Line: Promised Gift of Leon D. and Debra R. Black, and Purchase, Joseph Pulitzer and Florence B. Selden Bequests, and 1999 Benefit Fund, 2000
  • Object Number: 2000.255
  • Curatorial Department: Drawings and Prints

More Artwork

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Portfolio of facsimiles of works by Paul Gauguin, Berlin (Marees Gesellschaft), 1926
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1926
Study for Maternité II, Paul Gauguin French, Graphite
Study for Maternité II
Paul Gauguin
1899
Noa Noa. Voyage de Tahiti
Paul Gauguin
Marées-Gesellschaft
1926
Le Sourire, Paul Gauguin French, Woodcut on china paper
Le Sourire
Paul Gauguin
1899
Manao Tupaupau (Spirit of the Dead Watching)
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