Paul Gauguin fled from civilization to a bright paint

Paul Gauguin fled from civilization to a bright paint

 

Paul Gaugin Biography

Paul Gauguin is a french artist who is the biggest representative of post-impressionism. He was born in Paris on June 7, 1848. His father, Clovis Gauguin, was a journalist in the political chronicle Department and his mother, Alina Maria, came from a wealthy family in Peru.

In 1849, after a failed anti-monarchist coup, Clovis, not feeling safe at home, decided to leave France. Together with his family, he got on a ship bound for Peru, where he intended to settle with his wife Alina’s family and open his own magazine.

Paul Gaugin childhood

These plans were not to be fulfilled. On the way to South America, Clovis died of a heart attack. Until the age of seven, Paul lived in Peru and was grow up in his mother’s family.

The impressions of childhood, exotic nature, bright national costumes, carefree life at his uncle’s estate in Lima remained in his memory for a lifetime, telling in the irrepressible thirst for travel, in a craving for the tropics.

France, where he returned with his mother in 1855, never became his home. Initially, here he got a job as a stockbroker. The talented Gauguin succeeded in his profession, the man began to have money.

During his ten-year career, he became a respectable man in society and managed to provide his family with a comfortable apartment in the center of the city. Paul began to buy paintings by famous Impressionists, and in his spare time, inspired by the paintings of Gauguin began to try his talent. But painting was just a hobby in this period.

Since 1873, Paul began to do his first landscapes. Then he gets acquaint with Camille Pissarro, later they will be good friends.

Paul Gauguin social life

The artist, who hates social life and loves solitude, increasingly spent his free time drawing pictures, gradually the broker is beginning to be perceived not as an employee of a large company, but as an artist.

In many ways, the fate of Gauguin affected acquaintance with Edgar Degas. Degas supports Paul morally and financially, buying his expressive paintings.

It all started simply: he quit his job. The stockbroker Paul Gauguin was tired of all this fuss. In addition, in 1884, Paris was plunged into a financial crisis and he has a few broken deals. And he wants to turn his long-standing hobby into a profession.

Of course, it was a complete gamble because the new-fangled impressionist paintings that he painted were not in the least demand from the public. Therefore, it is natural that after a year of his artistic “career” Gauguin was already impoverished, and his wife took the children and went to Copenhagen to her parents.

To feed himself in somehow, he works in gluing posters. It was then that Gauguin had the idea to go somewhere in warm countries. In search of inspiration and relaxation from the bustling capital of France he visited Panama, lived with Van Gogh in Arles, visited Brittany.

Paul-Gauguin-Vision-after-the-Sermon-or-Jacob-Wrestling-with-the-Angel

 

Paul Gaugin Tahiti

After a childhood spent in Peru, he had a craving for exotic places. Gauguin went to Tahiti in 1891 , where he lived in Papeete and where he painted 80 paintings.

After a short-term (1893-1895) return to France (because of illness), he went forever to Oceania – first to Tahiti, and since 1901 to the island of Hiva-OA (Marquesas Islands), where he takes a young Tahitian woman to wife and works in full force: he writes landscapes, stories, works as a journalist. Gauguin wrote his best works there.

Paul Gauguin

When he was forty-seven years old (in 1895), he finally moved to Polynesia, Tahiti. However, this time life on the island is unsuccessful. Gauguin had fallen out with the new colonial administration and was therefore unable to find work. The accumulated money will quickly expire.

He paints pictures and sends it to France in the hope of selling. But the collectors were not particularly interested in Gauguin’s work, and the artist was mired in debt.

Paul Gauguin Artworks

Gauguin was stifled by depression and decided to commit suicide. But before he died, he wanted to paint the last picture, which would become a spiritual Testament.

By the end of December 1897, the work ” Where did we come from? Who are we? Where are we going?”  was ready. And in the first days of January, 1898, Gauguin took a box of arsenic and went to the mountains. There he decided to die.

However, the artist took too large a dose of poison, which provoked non-stop vomiting. Thanks to her, Gauguin was saved. The would-be suicide suffered through the night but survived. The next morning, when he woke up, I felt a forgotten thirst for life.

 

In 1898, fate took pity on Gauguin: paintings slowly began to sell, he managed to get a job as a clerk. A new stage of creativity began: Gauguin created a cycle of paintings in a dissimilar sunny color palette.

Paul Gauguin’s Paintings

His paintings are imbued with a sense of mystery, rich colors attract the eye again and again.

Van-Gogh-Painting-Sunflowers-by-Paul-Gauguin

In addition to painting, the artist was engaged in woodcutting, created several pottery works, wrote his own autobiography and left behind many stunning paintings.

Paul Gauguin Death

Fame came to the artist after his death, when in 1906 in Paris was exhibited 227 of his works. The influence of Gauguin’s work on the art of the XX century is undeniable.

When Will You Marry

Picture ” When Will You Marry?” 1892 Gauguin’s work has become one of the most expensive works of art in the world: the Qatar Museums gave about $300 million for it.

Now the artist’s paintings are extremely popular with both collectors and ordinary connoisseurs. Paul Gauguin’s painting “Thick tree” sold at auction in France for €9.5 million
3 rd of December 2019  at an auction in Paris.

Paul Gauguin Te Bourao

He introduced a certain novelty in art, abandoning the traditional principles of naturalism in favor of abstraction and symbols. Paul Gauguin created each picture in his own way, ignoring the canons and rules.