The Ox Cart (Le char a boeufs) after 1895

Curator: Stepping into Gauguin's world, we encounter "The Ox Cart," realized after 1895. It’s rendered in ink, a landscape brimming with a figuration reminiscent of a dream. Editor: It feels heavy, almost oppressive. The dense, dark inks create this textured, shadowy landscape where the ox and man seem to struggle against… what, exactly? The weight of the world? Curator: Maybe it is about burdens, physical and metaphorical. Gauguin often sought to depict the fundamental human connection with nature, the simple toil, unvarnished. Notice the foreground—that heavy patch seems to anchor the whole scene with this rough density. Editor: Right, and the composition is very deliberate, almost primitive, yet effective. The ink rendering gives it a strong sense of flatness. The eye isn't really led into a deep space, it’s held at the surface by these stark contrasts and almost brutal strokes. Is he rejecting conventional perspective intentionally, pushing us to focus on… what’s immediate? Curator: Gauguin yearned to capture what he felt, unburdened from formal constraints. There’s a raw honesty in the way the scene is presented. This simplicity could highlight his deep fascination with primal themes, his longing for a life untouched by modernity, an arcadia now lost forever. Maybe that weight you feel, it’s loss and the acceptance of the toil it involves. Editor: Yes, a tangible melancholy. Looking at the ox and the man, yoked together in labor... The use of stark black and white reinforces that feeling of inevitability, like they are trapped in a story with no easy exit, and all in a compressed timeframe of mark-making. A formal mirroring of thematic tension? Curator: Indeed. "The Ox Cart", born of ink, is Gauguin wrestling with simplicity and symbolism—with how much the earth can give and take. And within its deliberate austerity lies a powerful emotional resonance, one that echoes the shared burdens that tie us to both the earth and each other. Editor: It is like looking at a small, burdened world encapsulated in stark monochrome. There's almost a haunting quality—a dark fairytale framed in bold black lines.