Paul Gauguin

About Paul Gauguin's Paintings

Eugène Henri Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) was a French Post-Impressionist painter who abandoned a career in finance at thirty-five to pursue art with a single-minded intensity that astonished his contemporaries. His journey took him from Paris to Brittany, briefly to Arles with Van Gogh, and finally to Tahiti and the Marquesas Islands — a geographical arc that mirrored his artistic one, from European conventions toward something rawer, more spiritual, and more colour-saturated.

In Brittany he developed Synthetism: bold contours, flat planes of unmodulated colour, and a deliberate rejection of photographic naturalism. In the South Pacific he created the works for which he is best remembered — large canvases of Polynesian life painted in deep ochres, mauves, and tropical greens that pulse with symbolic weight. His influence on Fauvism, Expressionism, and the entire course of modern art is incalculable.

Famous Paintings by Paul Gauguin

• Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going? (1897) — his monumental Tahitian testament
• Ia Orana Maria (1891) — a Tahitian Annunciation
• Vision After the Sermon (1888) — the founding canvas of Synthetism
• Nafea Faa Ipoipo? / When Will You Marry? (1892)
• Two Tahitian Women (1899)
• The Yellow Christ (1889) — Breton faith and radical colour
• Spirit of the Dead Watching / Manao Tupapau (1892)
• Day of the God / Mahana no Atua (1894)
• Tahitian Women on the Beach (1891)
• The Siesta (c. 1892–94)

Why Paul Gauguin Paintings Endure

Gauguin's paintings endure because they do something genuinely difficult: they make the spiritual visible without recourse to conventional religious imagery. His colour is not descriptive but emotional — the crimson ground in 'Vision After the Sermon' tells you nothing about the literal colour of a field but everything about the intensity of religious vision. His Tahitian canvases operate the same way. The deep blues and tropical greens are not documentary but expressive, a constructed paradise that speaks to a hunger for meaning that has not diminished.

His formal achievements were equally lasting. The flattened picture plane, the bold outline, the rejection of Western perspective — all of these passed directly into Fauvism (Matisse acknowledged the debt openly) and then into Expressionism and beyond. When Picasso and Braque were assembling the grammar of Cubism, they were working in a world that Gauguin had helped to make possible.

Paul Gauguin Art Prints on Mojud

Mojud holds around 179 of Gauguin's works, from his Breton experiments and Arles period through the great Tahitian and Marquesan canvases. Every painting is available at full resolution to view, download for free, or order as a fine-art print made to order in our studio.

• 179 Paul Gauguin works in the collection
• Free high-resolution downloads — no account needed
• Museum-grade fine-art prints, made to order
• Ships across India

Frequently Asked Questions

• What are Paul Gauguin's most famous paintings?

  Gauguin is best known for 'Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?' (1897), his monumental Tahitian triptych, and for 'Vision After the Sermon' (1888), the painting that defined Synthetism. His Tahitian works — 'Ia Orana Maria', 'Nafea Faa Ipoipo?', and 'Spirit of the Dead Watching' — are among the most recognised images of Post-Impressionism.

• What style of painting did Gauguin use?

  Gauguin developed Synthetism — flat planes of bold, unmodulated colour, strong outlines, and a deliberate rejection of academic perspective. He was a leading Post-Impressionist who influenced Fauvism, Expressionism, and much of twentieth-century modern art through his use of colour as emotional rather than descriptive language.

• Why did Gauguin go to Tahiti?

  Gauguin left France for Tahiti in 1891 seeking what he described as a simpler, more primal world untouched by European industrialism. He found the island already much changed by colonialism, but constructed an inner vision of it that he painted into existence across dozens of major canvases over two extended stays.

• How many Gauguin paintings does Mojud hold?

  Around 179, spanning his full career from early Impressionist-influenced work through the Breton period, the Arles collaboration with Van Gogh, and the great Tahitian and Marquesan canvases of his final decades.

• Can I download Gauguin paintings for free from Mojud?

  Yes. All 179 Gauguin works in the Mojud collection can be downloaded in high resolution at no cost. No account is required.