Industrialisation in the 19th century prompted a ‘chromo revolution’, as the development of new artificially-produced paints provided new ways to experience and depict colour. Paul Gauguin used this colour development in new ways to visualise (and stereotype) the French colonial landscape. Born in 1848, Gauguin has been the subject of public interest and controversy since the late 20th century, as the focus of several blockbuster exhibitions. Gauguin’s time in Tahiti is notorious, but less well known is the period he spent in Martinique, then a French colony, which he visited in 1887.
Mia Thwaites, a history finalist at St John’s College, will be interviewing DPhil student Helena Erikstrup to explore Gauguin’s artwork in Martinique alongside wider themes of empire, histories of connection, and European-Caribbean visual culture.

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