Tahitian Woman, headpiece for Le sourire
1899/1900
Medium
Wood-block print in black ink on thin ivory laid Japanese paper
Dimensions
Image: 10.4 × 18.7 cm (4 1/8 × 7 3/8 in.); Sheet: 12 × 20.1 cm (4 3/4 × 7 15/16 in.)
Classification
woodcut
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
74761
Art Historical Context
**Tahitian Woman, headpiece *Le sourire*** Paul Gauguin, 1899/1900 *Wood-block print in black ink on thin ivory Japanese paper* Art Institute of Chicago during Paul Gauguin's final, this woodcut captures the artist's fascination with Tahitian life after his extended stays in French Polynesia (18911893 and 1895–1901). Titled as a headpiece for *Le sourire (The Smile), it served as an illustrative vignette in a publication or album, evoking the exotic allure of Polynesian women through simplified, bold contours. Gauguin, a Post-Impressionist pioneer of Primitivism, rejected European co...
About the Artist
Paul Gauguin · 1848–1903
Paul Gauguin (1848-1903) was a French Post-Impressionist painter whose bold experiments with color, form, and subject matter made him one of the most influential figures in the transition from 19th-century art to modernism. His rejection of European civilization for the perceived authenticity of 'primitive' cultures established an archetype of artistic exile that continues to resonate. Gauguin's ...