The White Horse

A white horse, its coat tinged with the green of the vegetation, has given the painting its title. It is drinking, standing in the middle of a stream which flows vertically through the composition. The solitary animal probably has a symbolic meaning related to the Tahitians'beliefs about the passage of the soul into another world. In Polynesia, white is associated with death and worship of the gods. Behind the sacred animal, two nude figures are riding bareback into the distance.