Still life with white bowl 1886

Paul Gauguin created "Still life with white bowl" with oil on canvas sometime in the late 19th century, amidst a rapidly changing European society. Gauguin, like many artists of his time, sought refuge from industrialization, turning to simpler, more ‘authentic’ ways of life. His quest for the primitive was intertwined with the colonial narratives of the time. The still life, a traditional genre often associated with domesticity and the feminine, becomes a site where Gauguin experiments with color and form, as well as his own identity. He once wrote, "Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going?". This piece seems to pause on the ‘what are we’; there is a tension between the familiar and the exotic, the European and the imagined ‘other’. The vibrant colors, the almost flattened perspective, evoke a sense of longing, a desire for something beyond the confines of Western culture. Gauguin challenges traditional artistic conventions, and invites us to reflect on our own place within this complex, ever-evolving world.