The Yellow Christ by Paul Gauguin
The Yellow Christ (in French: Le Christ jaune) is a painting executed by Paul Gauguin in 1889 in Pont-Aven. Together with The Green Christ, it is considered to be one of the key works of Symbolism in painting.
Gauguin first visited Pont-Aven in 1886. He returned to the village in early 1888 to stay until mid-October, when he left to join Vincent van Gogh in Arles, for little more than two months. Early in 1889, Gauguin was back to Pont-Aven to stay there until spring 1890. It was only for a short visit in summer 1889 to Paris to see the Exposition universelle and to arrange the Volpini Exhibition that Gauguin interrupted this sojourn. Soon after his return to Pont-Aven he painted The Yellow Christ.
The painting is a symbolic piece that shows the crucifixion of Jesus Christ taking place in 19th-century northern France as Breton women are gathered in prayer. Gauguin relies heavily on bold lines to define his figures and reserves shading only for the women. The autumn palette of yellow, red and green in the landscape echoes the dominant yellow in the figure of Christ. The bold outlines and flatness of the forms in this painting are typical of the cloisonnist style.
A study for The Yellow Christ in pencil is preserved in the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, and a version in watercolor is in the collection of the Art Institute of Chicago, gift of Elizabeth F. Chapman.
Details
- Artist
- Paul Gauguin
- Created
- 1889
- Medium
- oil on canvas
- Dimension
- 73cm × 91cm
- Passage
- John 19:16-27
- Housed at
- Albright-Knox Art Gallery Delaware Park, Buffalo (NY)
Found in: John, John 19, 19th century, Crucifixion
John 19:16-27
16 So then he delivered him to them to be crucified. So they took Jesus and led him away.
17 He went out, bearing his cross, to the place called “The Place of a Skull”, which is called in Hebrew, “Golgotha”,
18 where they crucified him, and with him two others, on either side one, and Jesus in the middle.
19 Pilate wrote a title also, and put it on the cross. There was written, “JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS.”
20 Therefore many of the Jews read this title, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, in Latin, and in Greek.
21 The chief priests of the Jews therefore said to Pilate, “Don’t write, ‘The King of the Jews,’ but, ‘he said, “I am King of the Jews.”’”
22 Pilate answered, “What I have written, I have written.”
23 Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took his garments and made four parts, to every soldier a part; and also the coat. Now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout.
24 Then they said to one another, “Let’s not tear it, but cast lots for it to decide whose it will be,” that the Scripture might be fulfilled, which says, “They parted my garments among them. For my cloak they cast lots.” Therefore the soldiers did these things.
25 But there were standing by the cross of Jesus his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene.
26 Therefore when Jesus saw his mother, and the disciple whom he loved standing there, he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son!”
27 Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother!” From that hour, the disciple took her to his own home.
John 19:16-27 · World English Bible
The artist
Paul Gauguin
1848 - 1903
Paris, France
Eugène Henri Paul Gauguin was a French post-Impressionist artist. Unappreciated until after his death, Gauguin is now recognized for his experimental use of colour and Synthetist style that were distinctly different from Impressionism. Toward the end of his life, he spent ten years in French Polynesia, and most of his paintings from this time depict people or landscapes from that region.