Forest Interior (Sous-Bois)

Paul Gauguin (French, 1848–1903)

1884

Medium/TechniqueOil on canvas

Dimensions55.5 x 46.1 cm (21 7/8 x 18 1/8 in.)

Credit LineGift of Laurence K. and Lorna J. Marshall

Accession number64.2205

On View

Not on view

ClassificationsPaintings

Collections

Europe

InscriptionsLower right: 1884 / P. GauguinProvenanceBy 1894, probably with Julien-François Tanguy (b. 1825 - d. 1894), Paris; June 2, 1894, sale to benefit Madame Tanguy, Hôtel Drouot, Paris [see note 1], lot 26, to Ambroise Vollard (b. 1867 - d. 1939), Paris, for 76 francs; October 13, 1894, sold by Vollard to Gaston Lévy, Paris, for 76 francs [see note 2]. 1907, Dr. Georges Viau (b. 1855 - d. 1939), Paris; March 4, 1907, Viau sale, Durand-Ruel, Paris, lot 20, sold to the Marquise de Ganay; to Comte François de Ganay (b. 1904 - d. 1984), Paris. 1951, with Galerie André Weil, Paris [see note 3]. Wildenstein, New York. By 1958, Laurence K. Marshall (d. 1980) and Lorna J. Marshall, Cambridge, MA [see note 4]; 1964, gift of Laurence K. and Lorna J. Marshall to the MFA [see note 5]; June 23, 2011, deaccessioned by the MFA for sale through Sotheby's, New York.

NOTES:
[1] Gauguin had consigned several pictures for sale to Tanguy, a collector and dealer, when he went to Tahiti in 1891. After the death of Tanguy, his friends -- particularly artists and other collectors and dealers -- organized an auction to benefit his widow. This painting seems to have been taken from Tanguy's stock (titled "Les Sapins"). See Merete Bodelsen, "Early Impressionist Sales 1874-94 in the light of some unpublished 'procès verbaux,'" Burlington Magazine 110, no. 783 (June, 1968): 347-348, p.v. no. 45.

[2] See Daniel Wildenstein "Gauguin, A Savage in the Making: Catalogue Raisonné of the Paintings, 1873-1888" (New York, 2002), vol. 1, p. 153, cat. no. 135; unless otherwise noted, the provenance information given here is taken from this source. For further on Vollard's transactions see Rebecca A. Rabinow, ed., Cézanne to Picasso: Ambroise Vollard, Patron of the Avant-Garde (exh. cat. Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2006), p. 229, n. 31.

[3] Included in the exhibition "Gauguin et ses amis" (Galerie André Weil, Paris, June 1 - 20, 1951), cat. no. 18.

[4] The Marshalls lent the painting to the exhibition "Paul Gauguin" (Haus der Kunst, Munich, April 1- May 29, 1960), cat. no. 17 (as "Unterholz"). According to Wildenstein 2002 (as above, n. 2), Mr. Marshall owned the painting by 1958.

[5] MFA accession date: December 9, 1964 (accession no. 64.2205).