1896, Paul Gauguin, Poemes Barbares -- Fogg Art Museum (Cambridge)
From the museum label: Gauguin’s model for this painting was likely Pau’ura a Tai, a 14-year-old girl whom the artist described as his “native wife” while living in Tahiti in the 1890s. Widely criticized today, the painter’s sexual relationships with local adolescents were also condemned by some of his contemporaries in French Polynesia. The painting maybe a response to the 1896 death in infancy of Gauguin’s daughter with Pau’ura a Tai. The figure’s wings, posture, and drapery evoke representations of the Virgin Mary and Christ Child. But instead of cradling a baby in her left arm, she protectively clutches her abdomen, emphasizing her loss. Reinforcing this narrative of birth and death is the presence at lower left of Ta’aroa, the Tahitian creator of the universe. Pau’ura a Tai averts her gaze from the deity, who Gauguin anthropomorphizes in an unusually childlike form. The girl’s downcast stare, coupled with her exposed chest, underscores the power imbalance between artist and sitter.
1896, Paul Gauguin, Poemes Barbares -- Fogg Art Museum (Cambridge)
From the museum label: Gauguin’s model for this painting was likely Pau’ura a Tai, a 14-year-old girl whom the artist described as his “native wife” while living in Tahiti in the 1890s. Widely criticized today, the painter’s sexual relationships with local adolescents were also condemned by some of his contemporaries in French Polynesia. The painting maybe a response to the 1896 death in infancy of Gauguin’s daughter with Pau’ura a Tai. The figure’s wings, posture, and drapery evoke representations of the Virgin Mary and Christ Child. But instead of cradling a baby in her left arm, she protectively clutches her abdomen, emphasizing her loss. Reinforcing this narrative of birth and death is the presence at lower left of Ta’aroa, the Tahitian creator of the universe. Pau’ura a Tai averts her gaze from the deity, who Gauguin anthropomorphizes in an unusually childlike form. The girl’s downcast stare, coupled with her exposed chest, underscores the power imbalance between artist and sitter.