Tiki in Gauguin Painting at Getty Center

I was strolling through the Getty, when very close to Van Gough's noted "Irises" and Monet's "Haystacks," there was an arresting painting by Paul Gauguin, which contains Tiki in the upper right corner. After all, he painted these in Tahiti, and was very interested in the idea of Tahiti & primitivism.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3046/2922108196_e3982ebeb2_o.jpg

From the Getty's Press Release:

French artist Paul Gauguin was born to a certain level of privilege, but in 1885 his passion for painting led him to abandon his successful banking job and dedicate himself to painting full-time. Thereafter, he eschewed the mundane existence of the “civilized” world and sought out adventures in more “primitive” environments that would feed his artistic spirit, and where he could escape the modern world and be close to nature in a tropical paradise. In 1891, he journeyed to Tahiti for the first time and took up residence in Mataiea Village. During this first stay in Tahiti, Gauguin became obsessed with the lush Tahitian landscape and featured it prominently in his genre scenes. Painted in 1892, Arii Matamoe (The Royal End) is a significant departure from the other works he painted at this time, first because it is an interior scene, but also because the painting is characterized by a certain morbidity that is quite different from the mood of sultry indolence that pervades most of his genre pieces.

In this composition, the severed head of a Polynesian male rests on a white cushion set upon a low table in a richly ornamented interior. The decapitated head dominates the foreground of the canvas and confronts the viewer with a disturbing vision—eyes rolling backward, jaw thrusting out, lips parted, and teeth bared. Behind this nature morte, a nude female figure crouches, cradling her head in her arms in a display of grief and mourning. She is framed by skull motifs in the geometric patterning on the wall and by a fierce, stylized mask near the floor by the table. Above the mask, a screen of three bamboo poles partially conceals a figure lurking in the shadows and separates the crouching figure from another woman rising up who appears to be shouting or wailing. In the background, just beyond a narrow porch, sit two glumly impassive figures, one bearing a tool, possibly an ax, the other cloaked in red. A carved, double-tiki figure marks the threshold of the scene, dividing the spaces of the dead and living.

Is the J.Paul Getty Trust being influenced by Tiki?

Hmm...well, as you suggest, Gauguin certainly was influenced...

If you enjoyed that, try the exhibition catalogue for "Gauguin Tahiti," published by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, in 2004.

Also, have a look at the collections of the Musée d'Orsay - they have excellent holdings of Gauguin's Tahitian-influenced wood carvings which would thrill the eyes of any tiki enthusiast.

GK