Volpini Suite: Old Women of Arles (Les Vieilles Filles [Arles])

Volpini Suite: Old Women of Arles (Les Vieilles Filles [Arles]) by Paul Gauguin is a significant zincograph created in 1889. This work belongs to the seminal "Volpini Suite," a set of eleven highly experimental prints exhibited that year at the Café Volpini in Paris. Gauguin executed the suite shortly after his return from Arles, utilizing the less common medium of zincography, a planographic printing process similar to lithography but using zinc plates instead of stone. This technical choice allowed the artist to explore rougher textures and highly graphic compositions, aligning with his new aesthetic goals.

The subject matter, featuring the austere presence of the Old Women of Arles, reflects Gauguin’s continued fascination with the local inhabitants of the regions where he traveled. The composition exemplifies the shift in Gauguin’s style toward Synthetism, focusing on flat color, bold outlines, and an expressive, symbolic interpretation rather than purely descriptive realism. Created during a highly productive period in France, the suite marked Gauguin's definitive move away from Impressionism and toward a modern, subjective rendering of reality. This set of experimental prints, often intentionally crude and vigorous in execution, was crucial for disseminating Gauguin's evolving artistic philosophy to a small but influential Parisian audience.

As an important work in the history of Post-Impressionist prints, this piece reveals Gauguin’s foundational role in modern graphic arts. The classification of this work as a print underscores the artist's inventive use of mass-producible media during a period of artistic revolution. Though relatively unknown at the time of their exhibition, these pioneering prints from the Volpini Suite are now highly regarded by scholars. This specific impression of Volpini Suite: Old Women of Arles (Les Vieilles Filles [Arles]) is part of the distinguished permanent collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art.