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Lot Essay
This work will be included in the forthcoming Paul Gauguin catalogue critique, currently being prepared under the sponsorship of the Wildenstein Institute.
This work is the only recorded copy that Paul Gauguin executed of Te fare Hymenee, or "The House of Songs", the watercolour that the artist included in the original manuscript for his travel journal Noa Noa, 1893-1897 (p. 63; Musée du Louvre, Paris). Noa Noa was the artist’s account of his time in Tahiti, consisting of writings and illustrations in different media that he collated after returning to France from his first journey to the South Seas in 1893.
This visit to Tahiti was the inspiration for many of Gauguin's finest paintings, and the watercolour included in the Noa Noa manuscript is a study for the oil of the same title, painted there in 1892 (Wildenstein no. 477; Christie’s, New York, 6 May, 2008, lot 28). The sleeping figure which is seen in both the oil and watercolour is also depicted in the engraving Intérieur de Case, circa 1898-1899 (Mongan, Kornfeld, Joachim no. 41).
Accompanying the watercolour in Noa Noa is a text by Gauguin describing the scene it depicts of his neighbours on the island meeting to sing the Tahitian songs, the “himenes”:
Sometimes in order to sing or converse they assemble in a sort of communal hut. They always begin with a prayer. An old man first recites it conscientiously, and then all those present take it up like a refrain. Then they sing, or tell humorous stories. The theme of these recitals is very tenuous, almost unseizable. It is the details, broidered into the woof and made subtle by their very naïveté, which amuse them. More rarely, they discourse on serious questions or put forth wise proposals.
(P. Gauguin, Noa Noa, tr. O.F. Theis, New York, 1919, p. 37).
During his time in Tahiti, Gauguin sent sketches of his works in progress to Georges Daniel de Monfried, a patron and fellow artist in Paris, and he is also known to have executed a small number of copies of his works. Referring to this practice, the correspondence between the two records: “So I have finished a philosophical Work on a theme comparable to that of the Gospel. I think it is good; if I have the strength I will copy it and send it to you” (The Letters of Paul Gauguin to Georges Daniel de Monfreid, tr. R. Pielkovo, New York, 1922, no. 95).
Originally part of the Monfried collection, the present work is one of this small group of copies.
This work is the only recorded copy that Paul Gauguin executed of Te fare Hymenee, or "The House of Songs", the watercolour that the artist included in the original manuscript for his travel journal Noa Noa, 1893-1897 (p. 63; Musée du Louvre, Paris). Noa Noa was the artist’s account of his time in Tahiti, consisting of writings and illustrations in different media that he collated after returning to France from his first journey to the South Seas in 1893.
This visit to Tahiti was the inspiration for many of Gauguin's finest paintings, and the watercolour included in the Noa Noa manuscript is a study for the oil of the same title, painted there in 1892 (Wildenstein no. 477; Christie’s, New York, 6 May, 2008, lot 28). The sleeping figure which is seen in both the oil and watercolour is also depicted in the engraving Intérieur de Case, circa 1898-1899 (Mongan, Kornfeld, Joachim no. 41).
Accompanying the watercolour in Noa Noa is a text by Gauguin describing the scene it depicts of his neighbours on the island meeting to sing the Tahitian songs, the “himenes”:
Sometimes in order to sing or converse they assemble in a sort of communal hut. They always begin with a prayer. An old man first recites it conscientiously, and then all those present take it up like a refrain. Then they sing, or tell humorous stories. The theme of these recitals is very tenuous, almost unseizable. It is the details, broidered into the woof and made subtle by their very naïveté, which amuse them. More rarely, they discourse on serious questions or put forth wise proposals.
(P. Gauguin, Noa Noa, tr. O.F. Theis, New York, 1919, p. 37).
During his time in Tahiti, Gauguin sent sketches of his works in progress to Georges Daniel de Monfried, a patron and fellow artist in Paris, and he is also known to have executed a small number of copies of his works. Referring to this practice, the correspondence between the two records: “So I have finished a philosophical Work on a theme comparable to that of the Gospel. I think it is good; if I have the strength I will copy it and send it to you” (The Letters of Paul Gauguin to Georges Daniel de Monfreid, tr. R. Pielkovo, New York, 1922, no. 95).
Originally part of the Monfried collection, the present work is one of this small group of copies.