Gauguin stayed in the village of Pont Aven in Brittany in 1886 and again in 1888, the date of this view. It shows a group of thatched farm buildings set in a fertile landscape at odds with the prevailing image of the desolate Breton countryside. Doubts have been raised about the painting’s authenticity due to a clumsiness in the composition and in the handling of the paint. However, there are some fine passages which are possibly beyond a copyist’s capabilities. Perhaps the inferior elements simply show Gauguin merely going through the motions.

Inscriptions / Translations:  Signed and dated I.r.: P. Gauguin 88

Notes:  Exhibited: 'Nineteenth Century French Paintings', Lefèvre Galleries, October 1926 (but not included in the catalogue); 'French Art of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries', Reid and Lefèvre, Glasgow, UK, 1937 (no. 28); 'French Masters of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries', Scott Gallery, Montreal, Canada, 1937 (no. 20); 'Melbourne Herald Exhibition of Contemporary Paintings', Town Hall, Melbourne, Australia, 1939 (no. 44); National Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, Australia, 1942; National Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia, 1943; National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia, 1944; 'Gauguin', Tate Britain, London, UK, 29 September 1955 - 26 October 1955; 'Gauguin', Arts Association, Oslo, Norway, November 1955; 'The Nabis and their Friends', The Stadtische Kunsthalle, Mannheim, Germany, 23 October 1963 - January 1964; 'Into the Light: French and British Painting from Impressionism to the Early 1920s', Royal Albert Memorial Museum, London, UK, 16 December 2011 - 11 March 2012; 'Into the Light: French and British Painting from Impressionism to the Early 1920s', Compton Verney Art Gallery, Warwickshire, UK, 31 March 2012 - 10 June 2012

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