Posted: May 11th, 2015

Read Abigail Solomon-Godeau’s essay on Gauguin and answer the questions

Read Abigail Solomon-Godeau's essay on Gauguin and answer the questions

Project description
1) According to Solomon-Godeau, Gauguin”provides the paradigm for primitivism as a white, Western and preponderantly male quest for an elusive object whose very condition of desirability resides in some form of distance and difference, whether temporal or geographical.” (p. 120) Unpack what Solomon-Godeau means in your own words. What is primitivism as a European cultural imaginary? What sources were available in urban Paris in Gauguin’s time that informed his primitivist fantasies? How does race and gender factor into Gauguin’s primitivism, according to Solomon-Godeau?

2) What actions and strategies did Gauguin adopt in his life and in his art in order to demonstrate his “nativization”? What, according to Solomon-Godeau, undermine the authenticity of Gauguin’s self-image as “primitive” artist?