Self-Portrait (1896)

Cushioned by his uncle’s legacy, Gauguin attempted to become a fashionable figure on the Paris art scene. However, he was still very much the rebel and courted controversy by dressing in an outlandish manner and setting up home with Anna, a Javanese prostitute, notorious for dancing naked with a monkey at gentleman’s parties. Gauguin’s own family were scandalised. His estranged wife Mette and their five children did not see a penny of Gauguin’s legacy. Indeed Gauguin’s relations with his family deteriorated even further after he discovered that Mette had intercepted payments due to him.

Gauguin failed to re-establish himself in the Paris art world. Although he still had admirers, the artist’s colony which he had previously dominated at Pont-Aven had long since dispersed. On revisiting the area, Gauguin brawled with some sailors and broke his ankle. While he was hospitalised, Anna stole most of his possessions, and found another lover. Gauguin was later convicted of a public order offence. Shortly afterwards Gauguin lost a legal action for the restitution of several pictures which he claimed had been sold without his permission. In an attempt to revive his flagging fortunes, Gauguin held another auction of his work. One of his closest friends, the dramatist August Strindberg, refused to write an introduction to the catalogue. The event was a complete disaster and Gauguin sold hardly anything.


It was against this background that Gauguin returned to Tahiti. Once again he slipped into a deep depression and found solace in self-pity, claiming the status of a persecuted martyr. In “Self-Portrait”, a gaunt and resigned Gauguin gazes out of the canvass. Once again he accuses the world of unjustly failing to appreciate his talent. However, unlike previous self-portraits Gauguin now appears resigned to his fate. The background is no longer bright and decorative but impenetrably dark and haunted by the vague outlines of two ghostly spectres. Gauguin now accepts that he will never achieve material success and has settled for the role of a visionary martyr.

Image Source: The Yorck Project

Jacob Wrestling with the Angel (1888)

On his return from Martinique, Gauguin rejoined the artist's colony at Pont-Aven in Brittany. He once again became its leading figure, proclaiming that a picture should reflect a deeper reality than the mere representation of its subject-matter. He believed that existence depended on some hidden equilibrium which art should reflect by depicting identifiable objects within the context of a schematic and thought-provoking pattern.

He studied Celtic art and was fascinated by ancient depictions of local Breton gods as abstract ornamental figures. He believed that some deeper reality could be achieved by exploiting the sensations inspired by various symbols.

During the spring and summer of 1888 he worked alongside Emile Bernard. Both painters used heavy outlines in the hope of creating profoundly harmonious patterns. This new method of dividing a canvass into distinct sections became known as cloisonnism ("compartmentalisation").


In "Jacob Wrestling with an Angel", Gauguin portrays pious Breton women in national costume reflecting on the sermon which they have just attended. Two supernatural figures, Jacob and the Angel, wrestle in the background. Jacob is desperate to convince the Angel that he has repented of his sins and will not let the Angel depart until he has succeeded in doing so.

Gauguin thus combines a biblical scene with a depiction of everyday life. He uses the tree in the foreground as a device to separate the peasant women from the wrestling match which mirrors their own hidden torments. He creates a supernatural atmosphere through the use of heavily-outlined areas of flat and harshly contrasting colours. He also employs a sharp perspective, emphasising the foreground in order to draw the viewer's gaze towards the struggle of conscience taking place in the background.

Image source: The Yorck Project

Breton Girls Dancing (1886)

Paul Gauguin lived in the small village of Pont-Aven in Brittany during the summer of 1886. He was broke at the time and Brittany was a cheap place to live.

Shortly before moving from Paris to Brittany he sent his son, Clovis, then seven, to Coppenhagen to live with his estranged Danish wife. Clovis had just survived an attack of smallpox and Gauguin, formerly a prosperous stockbroker, was earning a pittance posting bills.

Gauguin may have been going through a rough patch but he was an extremely strong personality. Indeed, he quickly established himself as the leader of the hundred or so other artists who had also been attracted to Pont Aven by the cheap living and the beautiful Breton landscape.

Paul Gauguin: Breton Girls Dancing National Gallery of Art, Washington

Image Source: The Yorck Project

In "Breton Girls Dancing", Gauguin develops his symbolic art in a rustic setting. He has a keen eye for local traditions and costumes. However, unlike the impressionists he has little interest in realism.

The dance has a dreamlike quality and the figures appear frozen and static. The juxtaposition of flat blocks of contrasting colour emphasised by use of straight lines creates a stark simplicity. Gauguin sees himself as a sophisticated observer of a primitive peasant ritual.

Image Source: The Yorck Project