Gauguin's World

Private Paul Gauguin art collection colors Texas in first U.S. viewing

American art lovers will find only one place in the U.S. where they will be able to see Gauguin's World, an exclusive collection of Paul Gauguin's paintings, sculptures, prints, and writings — the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.

Courtesy of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston

Paul Gauguin, Three Tahitians, 1899, oil on canvas, National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh.

More than 150 pieces from around the world make up the collection, organized by independent curator Henri Loyrette, former director of the Louvre and the Musée d’Orsay, Paris, and leading scholar of 19th-century French painting. Gauguin's World will be on display from November 3, 2024 through February 16, 2025. It promises to offer new perspectives on the artist's life and work.

The Houston showing follows the exhibition’s debut in Australia in June, at the National Gallery of Art, Canberra.

Paul Gauguin was a prolific artist throughout the 19th century, working across a variety of media. Born in Paris and moderately successful in his lifetime, Gauguin would come to be recognized for his use of color and styles that were successors to, yet distinct from, Impressionism. Among his most-known works were those he created during his last years in Oceania.

Gauguin’s World chronicles what curator Loyrette characterizes as Gauguin’s “inner quest for elsewhere,” and will be organized across six galleries. It presents the arc of Gauguin’s career from the 1870s through his final years, with half of the exhibition devoted to Gauguin’s work in Tahiti and the Marquesas Islands.

The works on display come from 65 public and private collections worldwide, including the Musée d'Orsay in Paris; National Galleries of Scotland; National Gallery of Art in Washington; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; The J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles; the National Museum of Western Art in Tokyo; and more. The Musée de Tahiti et des îles has lent both their Gauguins and important 19th-century Marquesan sculptural works to the exhibit.

“Gauguin’s World will offer an exceptional opportunity to understand the astonishing range of the artist’s achievement,” said Ann Dumas, MFAH consulting curator for the exhibition in a press release announcing the opening. “Fusing influences as diverse as European Old Masters, Peruvian potters and Egyptian tomb painters, Gauguin created not only sumptuous and richly colored paintings, but also developed entirely original methods of print making, and sculptures in wood and ceramic, dissolving conventional boundaries between art forms. His influence on avant-garde has been profound and continues in our own time.”

The exhibition is organized by Art Exhibitions Australia; National Gallery of Australia, Canberra; and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.

New

Historic Austin museum will close for more than a year for restoration

Photo courtesy of the City of Austin

The Elisabet Ney Museum will close at the end of 2024 and reopen in mid-2026.

Every building needs some maintenance here or there, and the historic Elisabet Ney Museum needs some extra-special care. Formerly the art studio and residence of its namesake, it's been standing since 1892. It'll spend 2025 in relative solitude, as it undergoes renovation for a year and a half with no visitors allowed.

The museum will close to the public December 30, 2024, and open again in the summer of 2026 if all goes according to plan, a news release from the City of Austin shares. It'll be a quiet period compared to the 21,000 people visiting from around the world each year.

According to a museum overview on the city's website, Elisabet Ney, a European portrait sculptor, bought the property and called her new studio Formosa. She worked on sculptures depicting important Texans like Stephen F. Austin and Sam Houston, and collected works of European contemporaries.

The building at 304 East 44th St. includes 3,700 square feet of museum space, which was converted by Ney's friends after her death in 1907. It retains its unique look that juxtaposes a Neo-Classical main studio from 1892 with a later addition from 1902 including a tower for her husband, Edmund, to write in. It is also on 2.5 acres of land, which has largely been restored to its natural state with native species.

A press release lists these tasks (verbatim) within the scope of the new work, referred to as the Capital Improvement Project (CIP):

Restoration of original exterior wood doors and windows
Upgrades and replacement of the heating, ventilation, and air conditioning system
Replacement of the exhibit and general lighting systems
Repairs to the roof, masonry, plumbing, and interior finishes.

There will also be work to do outside of the building. Workers will replace the pedestrian bridge across Waller Creek, stabilize a 20,000-square-foot portion of the bank, and make the grounds more accessible by adding new pathways.

Funding comes from several sources, according to a release: "the 2012 Bond, Proposition 14, the Parkland Dedication Fund, the Historic Preservation Fund, Partners in Preservation through the National Trust, and contributions from the Friends of the Elisabet Ney Museum."

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