Gauguin: The Other World

Dori pays tribute to the life and work of Gauguin without diminishing the artist’s sometimes unsympathetic character in this fabulously illustrated work. Dori concentrates on Gauguin’s life in the “other world” of Polynesia, where he created his most memorable paintings and eventually died, while also sketching his life away from Tahiti. Interwoven with the more realistic biography are flashes of Gauguin traveling into the mythological world of Tahiti, in mountaintop dreams and nighttime travels with a figure of death. Dori’s images range from the lush palette of the tropics to the more pallid colors of France, mixing panels with a texture like oil paintings for Gauguin’s waking life with etchings in shades of brown and black for the gods and spirits. Dori’s Gauguin is a man driven by his art, “the tyrant living inside,” with little love for those around him. A few final pages by art writer Céline Delavaux add context to this marvelous portrait. (Mar.)