the Marquesas – TOpoet

Not all my inspirations were writers. Some were painters, some musicians and some imaginary. At one time I was ‘infatuated’ with Paul Gauguin. I have reproductions of several of his paintings; including the Oriana Maria, The White Horse. I read the 1971 biography ‘Gauguin’s Paradise Lost” by Wayne Anderson repeatedly before lending to someone who never returned it 😦 I’ve read his collected letters.

Looking back I suspect it was his suffering as much as his painterly eye that fascinated me. Like his compatriot Van Gogh, he was derided by his contemporaries. I felt he was a true artist, one not enslaved by marketing, by the need to produce work that would sell. Though he was disappointed that his work didn’t sell, his sense of vision didn’t change.

I envied his travels in Peru, Denmark, Martinique, Tahiti, the Marquesas, & his life in France. I used to dream about my own Tahiti escape, though I’d be more inclined to let the local native men colonize me. It seemed like a time of greater innocence & of a deeper respect for the artist. He also had a gift for titles: “Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?” 🙂 His influence goes on in the art world.

As an inspiration his persistence in following his vision is a passion that I emulate. Sure, I’d love to be a best-seller but writing for marketability isn’t driving me creatively. It never really did. I knew a writer once who was putting down commercial press while trying to come up with a concept that would get her a writing grant. The market she picked was driving her creativity.

There are studies looking at the roots of genius – Van Gogh & poisonous paint (& other mental issues). Gauguin and untreated social disease. There are discussions of their problematic relationships with women filtered though the sensibility of 2019 values. Does it matter?