Gauguin's Crime By John Berger

Throughout John Berger’s writings, the common themes that arise from his short essays are “urgency” and “confidence.” He states that “when things are easy and not urgent, there is no confidence.” In one of Berger’s selected essays, “Gauguin’s Crime,” Berger raises the need for urgency and confidence through Paul Gauguin, a French Post-Impressionist artist whose experimental techniques with color influenced numerous modern artists such as Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse. According to John Berger’s novel, Ways of Seeing, often times, when we observe certain artists and their art, we tend to view them with a narrow, rigid view because “the way we see things is affected by what we know and what we believe.”(Berger, 8) Berger states that often times the preconceptions of what we know and believe can hinder what we “see” and how we observe

certain art and artists. Berger aims to provide his readers a “way of seeing” so that we often do not notice or take for granted. When we often learn about the artists that were influential in their time, we tend to see them as simply artists and ignore the artist’s intent behind his or her art . Berger’s urgency arises from his belief that in order for us to truly understand Gauguin’s works and his intentions behind his art, we must label him as a criminal and understand the inner conflict he undergoes throughout his life.

Through the dual aspects that dwell within Gauguin, the Indian and the Sensitive Man, Berger helps us see how Gauguin’s struggle for the balance between the two facets has led to his works and his intentions behind his art.
Berger paints Gauguin as a criminal to show that Gauguin was always conflicted with himself. Berger states that Gauguin was a criminal because of his decision in 1883 to leave his family and job to become a professional, dedicated painter. “One half of Gauguin’s character accepted this role so uncompromisingly that he was treated as a criminal: the other half, longing for acceptance and respect, made him feel a criminal.” (Berger, 65) He accepted the role of an outcast that comes along with being a professional painter therefore he is treated like a criminal. However, the other half of him wants to be acknowledged and accepted and that makes him feel like a criminal for seeking the approval of others. Another reason for his crime was of “the social attitude forced upon the imaginative artist at that time…” Berger is again conflicted because he believes that “the individual could only risk himself creatively against society.” Yet, the other half of Gauguin longed for respect and acknowledgement and is trapped attempting to please both sides of himself. In the process, he becomes a criminal to society and himself.
Berger furthers his analysis on Gauguin’s crime by illustrating the two natures that dwell within him: the Indian and the Sensitive Man.

Being Indian meant that he was the “Free Man, the Independent Hunter, the Pure Primitive of uncorrupted appetite.” The Sensitive Man consisted of contrasting personality, “...the man of Esteem, cultivated, articulate Taste, Affection and Family Feeling.” Gauguin embodying two polar aspects in him, he feels independence and guilt. Even in his letters, we can observe that he struggles to find the balance between his dualistic personalities. “When day after day, I eat my dry bread with a glass of water, I make myself believe it is a beefsteak.”(Berger, 66) Even from his letters during his travels illustrate how sometimes he forced himself to paint because he had the confidence that he will achieve his goal of finding the balance between the Indian and the Sensitive Man into his

art.
Eventually after the death of his favorite daughter and his suicide attempt, he achieves the “reconciliation and calm” that help him find what he desired. “The Sensitive man inspired the mood and often the titles of the paintings: Alone, Nevermore, Where Do We Come From, What Are We, Whither Do We Go? The Indian bound with contours as strong as leather the simple tangible forms.” (Berger, 66) The dual aspect of Gauguin that was originally holding him back, making him feel conflicted now collaborate to create what both the Indian and the Sensitive Man thought was the “heart of the matter: one to the essential mystery, the other to the instinctive body.” (Berger 67) In Gauguin’s, Nevermore, the painting embodies the dualistic aspect presented by Berger. Gauguin accurately portrays what the girl in the painting might have felt as she was drawn and painted by Gauguin. “...As she lay there, intensely aware on the one hand of the reality of her own body, and, on the other hand, of the intangible comfort and threat of the dimensionless images projected around her from her own mind” (Berger, 67), Gauguin was able to meticulously portray how the woman in the painting felt as she was being painted by him. The painting depicts both the “evocative and the real” through Gauguin’s free-spirited, primitive side and the affectionate, articulate side. The painting ,Nevermore, represents the chronological development of Gauguin through his years of struggle and the tangible form of what he hope to accomplish.
Berger believes that through the duality of interpretation explains the Gauguin’s works and his intentions behind his art. Berger illustrates that through a long period of struggle within himself, he was able to discover balance between the Indian and the Sensitive Man and in the end, he was able to “build from primitive material an alternative civilization to the one he inherited.” (Berger 67) By portraying an accomplished artist like Paul Gauguin as a criminal, Berger portrays the guilt and loneliness in Gauguin’s life being both “the Indian and the Sensitive man” and how they manifested onto his paintings.