CANBERRA.- An Australian-first exhibition of French post-Impressionist artist Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) provides a unique opportunity to see over 140 of his iconic works of art at the National Gallery in Canberra from 29 June to 7 October 2024. Curated by Henri Loyrette, esteemed scholar of 19th Century French art.

Gauguin’s World: Tōna Iho, Tōna Ao is one of the most ambitious exhibitions the National Gallery of Australia has ever staged.

This landmark presentation provides a rare opportunity for visitors to follow the artist’s life journey – from his Impressionist beginnings in 1873 to his final destination in French Polynesia where he created some of his most renowned works, visions of Tahiti that glowed with an entirely new palette of brilliant colour. Visitors will experience the complexity and diversity of his artistic practice in oil paint, ceramic, wood relief and woodcut.

The National Gallery, in partnership with Art Exhibitions Australia and curator Henri Loyrette, brings Gauguin’s work back to the Pacific region for the first time – to the part of the world where he realised his desire for a new life and a purity of artistic expression.

M. Loyrette said, ‘This is the first exhibition devoted to Gauguin and Oceania: a survey of his entire corpus as seen from his final destination, the Marquesas.’

‘When Gauguin landed in the Marquesas in September 1901, he knew that he had reached his journey’s end; he had at last found his ‘true homeland’, the place to which he had always aspired. In the twenty months before his death, he continued to develop his art while, in his writings, he set out to review his career as a whole. This is the starting point for an exhibition that reveals that introspection and the art that preceded it, returning to the questions that haunted him as an artist – the challenges that he set himself and solved in his quest for his own identity. By then he felt able to write: ‘Standing at his easel, the painter is slave neither to the past nor the present, neither to nature nor his fellow-man. It is he, still and forever he,’ he said. Gauguin defined.

National Gallery Director, Dr Nick Mitzevich said Gauguin’s World promises to be an artistic drawcard when it opens at the National Gallery on Saturday 29 June 2024.

‘This exhibition offers a rare opportunity for Australians to personally witness the significant and enduring art of Gauguin, featuring some of his most recognised and acknowledged masterpieces. Many of the works were created in the Pacific region, particularly Tahiti and the Marquesas Islands in French Polynesia.’

‘Like other contemporary and historic artists, Gauguin’s life and art have increasingly and appropriately been debated here and around the world. In today’s context, Gauguin’s interactions in Polynesia in the later part of the 19th Century would not be accepted and are recognised as such. The National Gallery will explore Gauguin’s life, art and controversial legacy through talks, public programs, a podcast series and films,’ Dr Mitzevich said.

Over 65 leading public and private lenders from as far as the United Kingdom, Japan, São Paulo, Tahiti and Abu Dhabi have generously agreed to share works of art from their collections. The National Gallery is particularly grateful to the Musée d'Orsay in Paris for generously supporting the exhibition as the major lender with 17 exceptional works from their collection.

Musée de Tahiti et des îles is also an important contributor to the exhibition, generously providing their works by Gauguin and important 19th Century Marquesan sculptural works, which form a special component of the exhibition, providing additional context to Gauguin’s artistic practice and illuminating his years spent in French Polynesia.

Organised in partnership with Art Exhibitions Australia and The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Gauguin’s World provides an opportunity to reconsider Gauguin from a holistic perspective. Following its presentation in Canberra, Gauguin’s World will be staged at The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, later in 2024.

Born in Paris in 1848, Paul Gauguin’s voyages saw him travelling to parts of the world almost unimaginable to 19th Century society. His life as an intrepid traveller started in childhood when his family fled to Peru, escaping the 1848 revolution; they later returned to France, settling in Orléans. At 17, Gauguin joined the merchant marines and navy and adventured across the world. Back in Paris, he established himself as a stockbroker and amateur painter, exhibiting his first landscape at the Paris Salon of 1876.

Driven to explore adventurous new territories and capture this in his art, Gauguin travelled to Brittany and Arles, Panama, the island of Martinique in the Caribbean, capturing the connections between people and their surrounding landscapes. He observed and absorbed many influences, both from his travels and from the experience of the Paris Exposition Universelle of 1889; the Tahitian, Polynesian and Cambodian pavilions in this great exhibition were transformative. In 1891 Gauguin left France for French Polynesia, living in Tahiti, where he created his most celebrated and compelling works.

Although largely unrecognised in his lifetime, Gauguin’s art is now celebrated – like that of his friend and rival Vincent van Gogh. Gauguin’s work defines Post-Impressionism and Symbolism: it was highly influential for later artists such as Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso. His vibrant use of colour and flattened decorative surfaces remains a motivating force for many artists in our times. Since his death in 1903, Gauguin has left two enduring and conflicting legacies – his art and himself.