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Paul Gauguin, Volpini Suite: Joys of Brittany, 1889, lithograph on yellow paper, the Cleveland Museum of Art, Dudley P. Allen Fund.

Claim to Fame: Paul Gauguin and the “Volpini Suite”

Thursday, Sep 20, 2012
6:30 p.m. - 7:30 p.m.

Law Building
1001 Bissonnet Map & Directions

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Annual Virginia and Ira Jackson Lecture
Claim to Fame: Paul Gauguin and the “Volpini Suite”
Presented by Heather Lemonedes, curator of drawings, Cleveland Museum of Art

To promote the sale of his paintings and boost his reputation, Paul Gauguin made his first set of prints, a suite of 11 lithographs printed on large sheets of canary yellow paper, during the winter of 1889 in Paris. The suite was a kind of self-portrait, a visual résumé of Gauguin’s career as an artist, and an advertisement for his subject matter and style.

That spring, Gauguin offered the prints for sale at a small, independent exhibition he and some of his artist friends organized on the grounds of the Paris Exposition Universelle. The exhibition was held in the Café des Arts, and the prints became known as the Volpini Suite, named after the restaurant’s proprietor. Among about 100 paintings that were densely hung on the walls of the café, Gauguin made his print portfolio available “on demand” at the bar.

In this illustrated lecture, Heather Lemonedes, co-curator of the exhibition Paul Gauguin: Paris, 1889 at the Cleveland Museum of Art and at the Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam, shares her research into the connections between the iconography in the Volpini Suite and Gauguin’s work in other media of the 1880s. She also explores the ways in which the lithographs may have influenced the mature style of the artist's Tahitian work of the 1890s.

This event is free, but tickets are required. To secure your seats, get your tickets in advance! Tickets are available online (printer required to print out ticket), by phone at 713.639.7771, or at any admissions desk at the MFAH. Please e-mail lectures@mfah.org with any questions.

 

This lecture receives generous funding from the Virginia and Ira Jackson Endowment Fund at the MFAH and is dedicated in fond memory of Virginia Jackson (1919–2007).