Manao tupapau (She Thinks of the Ghost or The Ghost Thinks of Her), from the Noa Noa Suite - Paul Gauguin

Mr. and Mrs. David C. Hilliard Fund; Meg and Mark Hausberg Fund; Mr. and Mrs. T. Stanton Amour Fund; Art and Peggy Wood Fund; Marjorie and Frank Brookes Hubachek Memorial Fund; Print and Drawing Fund; Julius Lewis Fund; Mary S. Adams Fund

Drawings European Art Modern Art Prints

"Manao tupapau (She Thinks of the Ghost or The Ghost Thinks of Her), from the Noa Noa Suite" by Paul Gauguin (1893/94) End-grain boxwood block, with a commercially prepared gray ground, sealed with an opaque pink oil medium, and inked in black ink.

Commentary

"Manao tupapau (She Thinks of the Ghost or The Ghost Thinks of Her), from the Noa Noa Suite" by Paul Gauguin (1893/94) invites a close look at how form and feeling work together. Its painted surface guides your eye through color, brushwor k, and contrast rather than through narrative alone. Themes to notice include print. This piece is held in the source collection's Prints and Drawings collection. Paul Gauguin is the artist behind this work. A useful anchor for reading the piece: Paul Gauguin French, 1848-1903. The work is cataloged within a France cultural context. How to look at this work: It is cataloged as print, which gives a clue to how the museum frames the object. Its medium (End-grain boxwood block, with a commercially prepared gray ground, sealed with an opaque pink oil medium, and inked in black ink) affects texture, durability, and how detail reads at different distances. Its listed dimensions (20.4 × 35.3 × 2.3 cm (8 1/16 × 13 15/16 × 15/16 in.)) suggest how intimate or monumental it may feel in person. Subject cues from the catalog include print. Compare this reading with the museum record at the source collection: https://www.artic.edu/artworks/223856

Sources: Art Institute of Chicago; Art Institute of Chicago / Public Records; Art Institute of Chicago Collection Data