Why it matters
A man's severed head lies on a white cushion, displayed before mourners in a palace. Gauguin, who wrote that both palace and women were 'of my invention', probably painted it 'to shock Parisians'.
Did you know?
- It was painted in 1892, on Gauguin's first stay in Tahiti.
- It may have been inspired by the death of King Pōmare V in 1891.
- It is in the J. Paul Getty Museum.
Based on the Wikipedia article Arii Matamoe (CC BY-SA 4.0).
