Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?
1897–1898 · Oil on canvas · Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
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This print
About this work
- Artist
- Paul Gauguin (1848–1903)
- Year
- 1897–1898
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Original size
- 139 × 375 cm
- Collection
- Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
- Movement
- Post-Impressionism
A frieze of Tahitian figures reads from right to left across nearly four metres of coarse canvas: a sleeping infant and three seated women, a figure reaching up to pick fruit at the centre, a blue idol with raised hands and, at the far left, an old woman crouched near death, with a white bird at her feet. Gauguin painted it in Tahiti over a few weeks at the end of 1897, in poverty and ill health, intending it as his final statement before a suicide attempt that failed. He inscribed the three questions of the title in the upper left corner and described the picture in letters as a philosophical work to be read like a gospel. It was shipped to Paris and shown in 1898. The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston bought it in 1936.
This exhibition-poster edition shows the whole work beneath original typography set in-house. The original is in the public domain.
Where it works
A long frieze nearly three times wider than tall, so it needs a wide uninterrupted wall: above a long sofa, console or hallway bench at 24×36. A black frame on deep blue or green; the coarse canvas and sombre mood suit a study or den.
Style, size & framing detail
- Style
- Exhibition poster of a Post-Impressionism painting
- Era
- 19th century (1897–1898)
- Orientation
- Portrait
- Palette
- cream & beige
- Mood
- grand
- Rooms
- hallway or entryway, study or library, living room, dining room
- Good gift for
- housewarming, art lovers
Size. We'd hang this one at 24×36. Prints at 12×18, 16×24, 24×36 in — 12×18 for a shelf, desk or a gallery-wall grid; 16×24 above a desk, console or in a hallway; 24×36 as the statement piece above a sofa or bed.
Framing. Exhibition posters sit best in a slim black frame with no mat — the typeset margin is the mat.
Pairing. Pairs as a set of three with other famous painting prints (10% off three or more).
Details & materials
Shipping & returns
Is this the whole painting, or a crop?
Is Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going? in the public domain?
What is it printed on?
When was Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going? painted, and in what medium?
What size works above a sofa or bed?
About this design
The Madten promise
A fine-art print
The same artwork as a clean fine-art print — the image shown large with a minimal caption.
