Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Biographer Prideaux (I Am Dynamite!) presents a sympathetic portrait of 19th-century post-impressionist painter Paul Gauguin. Born in 1848 France, Gauguin spent much of his childhood in Peru, where his anti-Bonapartist parents had fled threats of government persecution. As an adult, he burned through a series of jobs--merchant marine, stock trader--before discovering painting from impressionists exhibiting in Paris. The author depicts her subject as a perennial outsider who spent much of his life wandering the world in pursuit of artistic success, from Panama during the digging of the canal, to Arles, where Van Gogh attempted to enlist him in plans to form a "Studio of the South," to Tahiti--where Gaugin painted his "mythical and monumental" 1898 work Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?, which interwove "Polynesian, classical and Christian references" and inspired Pablo Picasso to explore African art, from which cubism evolved. Prideaux draws heavily on Gauguin's own writings, including a recently discovered autobiography, to draw a rich psychological portrait that is buttressed by abundant historical detail. It makes for a revealing window into an unique artistic mind. Illus. (May)
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Review by Library Journal Review
Biographer Prideaux (I Am Dynamite!: A Life of Nietzsche) explores the life of 19th-century French post-impressionist painter Paul Gauguin, examining new primary sources that challenge some myths about the self-taught artist. As the audiobook methodically builds up to how Gauguin's unconventional career eventually took off in Paris, narrator Wiley skillfully shifts between Gauguin's "freer" life in Tahiti and his European milieu, where he felt more restrained. Prideaux shows how Gauguin influenced the art world while also advocating for the Tahitian people as they fought against French colonial injustices; however, listeners might want to know that Gauguin too was alleged to have exploited Indigenous Tahitians, even marrying and impregnating a 13-year-old girl whom he met on the island. Prideaux's account is also rich with stories of the successes and failures of Gauguin's peers and successors, such as Matisse and Picasso. Throughout, Prideaux offers thoughtful speculation about Gauguin's time in Tahiti and the nature of his relationships with the Tahitians depicted in his paintings. VERDICT Though often associated with controversy and colonialism, Gauguin is depicted in a more compassionate light in Prideaux's must-listen work, although his contradictions remain for the audience to consider. For a more critical lens on Gauguin's life and legacy, pair the biography with one of the historical novels about the painter, The Way to Paradise by Mario Vargas Llosa or Paul by Daisy Lafarge.--Sharon Sherman
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
Seeing a pioneering artist in a new light. In an 1895 interview inL'Écho de Paris, Paul Gauguin is described as "the wildest of all the innovators, and of all the 'misunderstood' artists the one least inclined to compromise." Prideaux (Edvard Munch: Behind the Scream,Strindberg: A Life, andI Am Dynamite! A Life of Nietzsche) revisits Gaugin's legacy, which has been marred by controversy; his time in Tahiti, where he sought to escape European civilization, was complicated by accusations of appropriation and problematic relationships with young Tahitian girls. Prideaux bases this work on an unpublished manuscript,Avant et après, which Gauguin wrote during the last two years of his life and sheds new light on his more progressive thinking about women, morality, and the Catholic Church. Long admired for his innovative and bold use of color, his rejection of Western artistic conventions, and his lasting impact on modern art, Gauguin's reputation, however, had been long tainted by colonialism. Gauguin may have idealized the noble savage, but here Prideaux attempts to romanticize him as the savage. She reminds us that Gauguin thought of himself this way; as an outsider in France, he'd shout: "I am a savage from Peru!" The notion was corroborated by his friends: Edgar Degas described him as "a hungry wolf without a collar," and playwright August Strindberg, inspired by Gauguin, claimed, "For I, too, begin to feel a great need to turn savage and to make a new world." What others see as appropriation Prideaux rebrands as forward thinking: About works such asIa orana Maria (Hail Mary), she writes, "Gaugin had taken the foundational legend of Christianity and synthesized it through a multi-racial lens." Newly definitive, impeccably researched, and lavishly illustrated. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
