Paul Gauguin Ia Orana Maria Part.2

IV. The Aesthetics of Synthesis

These religious fantasy paintings not only confront Impressionism head-on in their thematic content but also display a diametrically opposed approach in their formal expression. In fact, when it comes to painting a motif like “female figures in an outdoor setting,” it is challenging to imagine two more contrasting works than Monet’s “Woman with a Parasol” and Gauguin’s “Ha Orana Maria.” Monet’s approach involved placing his main motif, a female figure, almost soaring into the sky with a lower vantage point, while Gauguin’s figures are submerged within a richly detailed background, as previously noted. However, it’s not just the difference in composition; it’s also the way they perceive the background and the subjects.

In Monet’s works, everything, be it the grass, the figures, or the sky, is composed of meticulous touches. Monet’s eye, which sought to observe everything bathed in the diverse hues of sunlight, demanded that every object be analyzed into countless brushstrokes. Conversely, in Gauguin’s paintings, substantive entities like figures or fruits, as well as the background filled with flowers, leaves, and even the path and grass, all appear to have clear and distinctive forms, as though they have been meticulously cut with scissors and pasted onto the canvas. The decorative quality we initially perceived in this artwork was, in fact, the result of the combination of these clearly defined forms, each possessing vibrant colors.

Thus, Gauguin’s technique of capturing forms, using solid contour lines, stands in stark contrast to Impressionism’s divisionist approach, where everything was reduced to touches and, eventually, points. If Impressionism adhered to “division,” Gauguin and his fellow artists, in contrast, upheld “synthesis.” In fact, in 1889, the year of the Paris Universal Exposition, Gauguin organized a significant exhibition at Café Volpini, known as the “Impressionist and Synthetist Exhibition.”

Of course, it’s important to note that the clear contour lines seen in this work do not imply the presence of real-world forms. Rather, they indicate a process of bestowing abstracted images upon the objects of reality. It’s not about faithfully capturing the tangible aspects of reality; it’s about infusing these subjects with abstracted imagery. In this sense, Impressionism’s color division was also a form of fabrication. Monet believed that through this fabrication, he could capture the true appearance of the tangible world. Gauguin, on the other hand, was aware that synthesis meant departing from the reality, towards abstraction. He recognized this and endeavored to impose a new intellectual order on his canvas, one that departed from the natural world.

This intention of Gauguin’s is already clearly evident in “Vision After the Sermon,” painted in 1888. In August of the same year, Gauguin wrote the following letter to his friend Emile Schuffenecker, while he was still in Brittany:

“I want to offer you a piece of advice. Do not replicate nature too faithfully. Art is an abstraction; derive an abstraction from nature by dreaming in front of it and thinking more of the creation process than the result. It is the same as God’s creation process, and it is the only way to approach the divine in art…”

We can see that the aesthetics that dominated Gauguin during his Tahitian period had already taken clear shape during his time in Brittany.

V. Tahitian Women

So, is “Tahitian Women on the Beach” merely a continuation of Gauguin’s religious fantasy theme and his formal aesthetic of synthesis, following in the footsteps of his late 1880s work, “Vision After the Sermon”? Does the Gauguin of the 1890s offer nothing more innovative than the Gauguin of the 1880s?

Certainly not. The transformation is far more dramatic than one might believe, given that there’s only a span of a few years between “Tahitian Women on the Beach” and “Vision After the Sermon.” Gauguin lived for more than a decade after creating “Tahitian Women on the Beach,” and when we consider the minimal changes that occurred in his style over that decade, they pale in comparison to the dramatic shift that took place around 1891.

The origin of this pivotal change is, without a doubt, Tahiti. Gauguin’s solitary voyage to Tahiti, leaving behind family, friends, and his homeland, took place in April 1891. In just a few months after his arrival, “Tahitian Women on the Beach” was already created. The seed for this magnificent blossoming was already within Gauguin, but to bring it to fruition, he needed the distant, exotic environment of a non-Western culture.

The influence of Tahitian landscapes manifested primarily in the complex and diverse blending of colors. In the late 1880s, Gauguin occasionally used intense colors like red and yellow, but not to the extent found in this work. His color palette during his Brittany period was comparatively subdued. The lush world of colors that became a hallmark of his later works is undeniably a result of his experiences in Tahiti.

Furthermore, the third and perhaps most significant influence of Tahiti on Gauguin’s art was the discovery of a new type of human. In the late 1880s, Gauguin had already been incorporating the distinctive folk costumes of Brittany, particularly the white headdresses, as motifs in works like “Vision After the Sermon.” However, the Breton folk costumes were valuable solely as motifs. In Tahiti, Gauguin encountered something entirely different.

Of course, the Maori men and women, with their striking features, ample brown skin, and robust bodies, were fitting motifs for the synthesis aesthetic. However, simultaneously, their strange and vivid appearances conjured associations with religious icons, adding a peculiar and intense dimension to the paintings.

The model for the Madonna in “Tahitian Women on the Beach” was Tehura, an indigenous woman who Gauguin started living with shortly after his arrival in Tahiti. Tehura became the model not only for this painting but also for many other significant works such as “Tahitian Women on the Beach,” “Parahi te Marae,” and “Manaò tupapaù.” Gauguin seemed to want to convey the proud primitive vitality of the Maori people through Tehura’s appearance.

Originally, the composition of “Tahitian Women on the Beach” appears to be based on a photograph of Borobudur relief in Java, Indonesia, which Gauguin likely acquired during the 1889 Paris Universal Exposition. The somewhat awkward pose of the two women can be attributed to this source. Gauguin placed Tehura at the location where the Buddha stands in the Borobudur relief, transforming her into the Madonna. In this painting, Tehura is undeniably the central figure, and Gauguin, by depicting her as the Madonna, added not only a spiritual dimension to the canvas but also infused it with a quasi-heretical, exotic, and powerful new life force, almost at odds with Christian tradition.