Paul Gaugin’s role in the Symbolist movement essay:
Paul Gaugin is one of the most famous painters of the 19th – early 20th century. He produced a great influence on the development of art and created a number of works of art that made him quite a popular painter. He was born in 1848 in Paris and began his work there but it was not painting as one may think, he worked as a stockbroker while painting was his passion, which he dedicated his free time to. After his marriage he began to work with Camille Pissaro who was Impressionist by style and certainly influenced Gaugin’s artistic work. In 1884 he and his family moved to Denmark where Gaugin attempted to work as a businessman but failed and next year he left hid family in Denmark and returned to Paris where he began to work as a professional painter. During his work he got acquainted with other artists who were quite famous and played an important role in the art development of that time, among them were such artists as Emile Bernard, Charles Laval, and finally Vincent van Gogh. He was definitely influenced by some of these painters. As a result he gradually evaluated from an impressionist as he was when he closely cooperated with Camille Pissaro to synthetism and symbolism. His career as a painter is a kind of transformation of an artist from naturalism to abstraction and symbolism that were so typical for his later works. His works that are referred to a symbolist style are characterized by ample bright colors, thick and flat shapes. Another peculiarity of his paintings was the lack of perspective that made his work particularly intriguing and, to a certain extent, mysterious that is achieved through the use of symbolism and could be interpreted differently according to the personality of a viewer. Probably, such a shift in style was the result of not only communication with other artists but the result of his active way of life, for it is well known fact that he traveled a lot and lived quite a long time in Panama, Martinique and, finally, Tahiti. His last residence was the Marquesas Islands where he died after a long disease in 1903. Read more »
