Seated Tahitian Woman (recto); Standing Tahitian Woman (verso)

Seated Tahitian Woman (recto); Standing Tahitian Woman (verso) by Paul Gauguin French, 1848-1903 is a pivotal double-sided study executed during the artist’s influential first sojourn in Tahiti (1891-1893). Classified as a drawing, this piece demonstrates Gauguin’s rapid draftsmanship and his reliance on observational sketches for larger compositions. The medium is pen and brown ink, applied over preparatory graphite lines on cream wove paper. Historical analysis indicates that the rich brown ink was likely derived from an originally purple pigment, a characteristic color choice of this specific period.

The intense economy of the work, utilizing both the recto, featuring a Seated Tahitian Woman, and the verso, depicting a Standing Tahitian Woman, highlights Gauguin’s commitment to documenting the figures of Polynesia. This sheet was originally part of a sketchbook that the artist maintained while developing his new visual vocabulary, which sought to distance itself from the conventions of metropolitan France. Gauguin often used these ink studies as sources for his later major oil paintings and for the production of graphic prints.

The drawing technique reveals the foundational structure beneath Gauguin’s Symbolist compositions, capturing the essence of the figures with bold, defining ink lines. The work provides critical insight into the artist’s process of translating real-life observation into a simplified, yet powerful aesthetic representation. Removed from its original context within a sketchbook and carefully trimmed, the piece now resides in the collection of the Art Institute of Chicago, where it serves as a significant example of Post-Impressionist drawing and Gauguin’s exoticist turn.