''Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?'' (french: D'où venons-nous ? Que sommes-nous ? Où allons-nous ?) is a painting by French artist

Paul Gauguin Eugène Henri Paul Gauguin (, ; ; 7 June 1848 – 8 May 1903) was a French Post-Impressionist artist. Unappreciated until after his death, Gauguin is now recognized for his experimental use of colour and Synthetist style that were distinct fr ...

. The painting was created in

Tahiti Tahiti (; Tahitian ; ; previously also known as Otaheite) is the largest island of the Windward group of the Society Islands in French Polynesia. It is located in the central part of the Pacific Ocean and the nearest major landmass is Austra ...

, and is in the Museum of Fine Arts in

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

, Massachusetts. Viewed as a masterpiece by Gauguin, the painting is considered "a philosophical work comparable to the themes of the Gospels".Anderson (1967) p. 238. The painting is notable for its enigmatic subject and atmosphere. Some scholars have attributed these qualities to personal conflicts that Gauguin experienced while creating this artwork. It is an accentuation of Gauguin's trailblazing Post-Impressionistic style.

Background

Gauguin had been a student at the Petit Séminaire de La Chapelle-Saint-Mesmin, just outside

Orléans Orléans (;"Orleans"
(US) and liturgy; the teacher for this class was the

Bishop of Orléans A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ca ...

, Félix-Antoine-Philibert Dupanloup. Dupanloup had devised his own catechism for students to lead them towards proper spiritual reflections on the nature of life. The three fundamental questions in this catechism were "where does humanity come from?" "where is it going to?", and "how does humanity proceed?". Although in later life Gauguin was vociferously anticlerical, these questions from Dupanloup's catechism had lodged in his mind, and "where?" became the key question that Gauguin asked in his art. Looking for a society more simple and elemental than that of his native France, Gauguin left for Tahiti in 1891. In addition to several other paintings that express his highly individualistic mythology, he completed this painting in 1897. During the process of creating this painting, Gauguin experienced a number of difficult events in his personal life. He suffered from medical conditions including eczema, syphilis, and conjunctivitis. He faced financial challenges, going into debt. He was also informed about the death of his daughter from Copenhagen. From one of many letters to his friend, Daniel de Monfreid, Gauguin disclosed his plan to commit suicide in December 1897. Before he did, however, he wanted to paint a large canvas that would be known as the grand culmination of his thoughts. Following the completion of ''Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?'', Gauguin made a suicide attempt with arsenic.

Details and analysis

The three major groups in the painting reflect the overall themes presented in the title. The three crouched women with a sleeping child on the right represent the beginning of life; the middle group symbolizes the daily existence of young adulthood; in the final group, according to the artist, "an old woman approaching death appears reconciled and resigned to her thoughts"; at her feet, "a strange white bird...represents the futility of words" or "the uselessness of vain words". Together, the painting from right to left suggests the cycle of "birth-sin-death". Outside of this cycle of life, there is a blue figure. The blue idol in the background represents what Gauguin described as "the Beyond." Gauguin approaches the life cycle from a feminine perspective. The girl surrounded by kittens demonstrates the purity of "girlhood". The figure in the center is placed in a "Garden of Eden motif"; she is picking fruits from a tree. Gauguin intended to represent this woman as sin, like the allegory of

Eve Eve (; ; ar, حَوَّاء, Ḥawwāʾ; el, Εὕα, Heúa; la, Eva, Heva; Syriac: romanized: ) is a figure in the Book of Genesis in the Hebrew Bible. According to the origin story, "Creation myths are symbolic stories describing how the ...

. Maternity is represented through the figures that surround the baby. Along with the motherhood of a woman's life, Gauguin also displays the idea of "domestic submission" through the bracelet and collar worn by the mature woman on the left and the white goat, respectively. Finally, the state of seniority can be seen through the old woman on the left. Near the blissful people are two sorrowful women by a tree who stand in contrast with their surroundings. In front of these women is a crouched figure who lifts her arm. The three women have been interpreted by one scholar as representing the contrast between enlightenment and “superstitious, irrational, even barbaric traditions”.Dorra (2007) p. 256. The painting also includes a number of inscriptions. Gauguin inscribed the original French title in the upper left corner: ''D'où Venons Nous / Que Sommes Nous / Où Allons Nous''. The inscription the artist wrote on his canvas has no question mark, no dash, and all words are capitalized. In the upper right corner he signed and dated the painting: ''P. Gauguin / 1897''.''Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?'', Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Retrieved 23 February 2015.

Style

The painting is an accentuation of Gauguin's trailblazing Post-Impressionistic style; his art stressed the vivid use of colors and thick brushstrokes, while it aimed to convey an emotional or expressionistic strength. It emerged in conjunction with other

avant-garde The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretical ...

movements of the twentieth century, including cubism and fauvism.

Reception and provenance

In 1898, Gauguin sent the painting to Georges-Daniel de Monfreid in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

. Monfreid passed it to Ambroise Vollard along with eight other thematically related pictures shipped earlier. They went on view at the Galerie Vollard from November 17 to December 10 of 1898. The exhibition was a success, although ''D'où Venons Nous?'' received mixed reviews. unsuccessfully tried to raise funds to purchase the painting on behalf of France. purchased the painting from Vollard for 2,500 francs in 1901. Subsequently, Frizeau sold the painting around 1913 to

Galerie Barbazanges The Galerie Barbazanges was an art gallery in Paris that exhibited contemporary art between 1911 and 1928. The building was owned by a wealthy fashion designer, Paul Poiret, and the gallery was used for Poiret's "Salon d'Antin" exhibitions. The gal ...

, which sold it before 1920 to the Norwegian ship owner and art collector . He sold the painting via Alfred Gold in 1935, and it was bought by the Marie Harriman Gallery in

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in 1936. The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, acquired it from the Marie Harriman Gallery on 16 April 1936.

Critics and Gauguin

Critics thought of Paul Gauguin as one of the major artists of the time, but they were unsure about the artist's intentions in this work. Thadée Natanson of '' La Revue Blanche'' expressed confusion over its meaning, describing it as "obscure". The critic André Fontainas of the ''

Mercure de France The was originally a French gazette and literary magazine first published in the 17th century, but after several incarnations has evolved as a publisher, and is now part of the Éditions Gallimard publishing group. The gazette was published ...

'' acknowledged a grudging respect for the work but thought the allegory would be impenetrable without the inscription, and compared the painting to ''Inter artes et naturam (Between Art and Nature)'' of

Pierre Puvis de Chavannes Pierre Puvis de Chavannes (14 December 1824 – 24 October 1898) was a French painter known for his mural painting, who came to be known as "the painter for France". He became the co-founder and president of the Société Nationale des Beaux ...

. Although Gauguin appreciated the works of Puvis, he wanted to differentiate his works from “the great master of decorative painting”. He explained to Fontainas that the objectives of Puvis’s works were predetermined and could be conveyed in words; he believed his works consist of a great "pictorial language of feelings".Shackelford (2004) p. 183. Gauguin believed that his paintings had abstract, inexplicable qualities that could not be expressed in literary terms. Inter_artes_et_naturam_(Between_Art_and_Nature)_MET_DT201007

Inter_artes_et_naturam_(Between_Art_and_Nature)_MET_DT201007

References and sources

;References ;Sources *Andersen, Wayne V. “Gauguin and a Peruvian Mummy.” ''Burlington Magazine'' 109, no. 769 (1967): 238–43. * Boime, Albert . (2008) ''Revelation of Modernism: Responses to the Cultural Crisis in Fin-de-Siécle'' .

University of Missouri Press The University of Missouri Press is a university press operated by the University of Missouri in Columbia, Missouri and London, England; it was founded in 1958 primarily through the efforts of English professor William Peden. Many publications a ...

, * Boyle-Turner, Caroline. ''Current Issues in 19th-Century Art'' . Zwolle : Amsterdam: Waanders ; Van Gogh Museum, 2007. * Dorra, Henri. ''The Symbolism of Paul Gauguin : Erotica, Exotica, and the Great Dilemmas of Humanity'' . Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007. * Gayford, Martin. (2006) ''The Yellow House: Van Gogh, Gauguin, and Nine Turbulent Weeks in Arles'', London: Penguin Books, . * Mathews, Nancy Mowll (2001). ''Paul Gauguin, an Erotic Life'' . New Haven, Connecticut:

Yale University Press Yale University Press is the university press of Yale University. It was founded in 1908 by George Parmly Day, and became an official department of Yale University in 1961, but it remains financially and operationally autonomous. , Yale Universi ...

, * Rousseau, Theodore. ''Gauguin: Paintings, Drawings, Prints, Sculpture'' . Art Institute of Chicago, 1959. * Shackelford, George T. M., Frèches-Thory, Claire, Galeries nationales du Grand Palais, and Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. ''Gauguin Tahiti'' . Boston, MA: MFA Publications, 2004. * Stuckey, Charles. "Gauguin Inside Art" in Eric M. Zafran. Ed., ''Gauguin's Nirvana: Painters at Le Pouldu 1889-90'' . New Haven: Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford in association with

, 2001, . * Thomson, Belinda (1987). ''Gauguin'' . London:

Thames and Hudson Thames & Hudson (sometimes T&H for brevity) is a publisher of illustrated books in all visually creative categories: art, architecture, design, photography, fashion, film, and the performing arts. It also publishes books on archaeology, history, ...

. .

External links

* * {{ACArt Paintings by Paul Gauguin Paintings in the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston Tahitian art 1897 paintings Birds in art Cats in art Goats in art Water in art Dogs in art