Arearea

Arearea (also known by the French title Joyeusetés, 'amusements') is an oil on canvas painted by Paul Gauguin in Tahiti in 1892; measuring 74.5 × 93.5 cm, it has been in the Musée d'Orsay, Paris, since 1986, after entering the French national collections in 1961 by bequest of Mr and Mrs Frédéric Lung.

Gauguin arrived in Tahiti for his first stay in April 1891, looking for traces of a primitive way of life. He drew on what he saw around him, but also on local tales and ancient religious traditions, to compose imaginary scenes, and the Orsay presents Arearea as typical of these works in which dream and reality sit side by side. The motifs in the foreground recur in other paintings of the period and were probably observed: two women seated at the foot of a tree, one playing a small flute, the other sitting cross-legged facing the viewer, and a red dog nosing the ground.

The background scene is invented. A group of women perform a rite before a statue, for which Gauguin enlarged a small Maori-style figure to the scale of a great Buddha. There is no sky; instead, bands of green, yellow and red build the structure of the picture, and the tree trunk cuts the canvas vertically. The result is an idealised, archaic Polynesia in which people live under the protection of the gods amid lush nature. Gauguin's prominent, collarless dogs have prompted much speculation about their meaning.

The painting, inscribed 'AREAREA' and signed and dated at lower right, was among the Tahitian works Gauguin exhibited at Durand-Ruel's gallery in Paris in November 1893 on his return. The show did not bring the success he had hoped for: many friends were irritated by the Tahitian titles, and the red dog drew particular sarcasm. Gauguin nevertheless counted Arearea among his best canvases and bought it back himself in 1895, before leaving Europe for good. It was in the Louvre's collection before moving to the Orsay.