Vier Bretoninnen

In the summer of 1886 Gauguin was nearly broke. He had walked away from a comfortable career as a Paris stockbroker to paint full time, and he went to Pont-Aven in Brittany partly because it was cheap and partly because it felt older and plainer than modern France. That search for something simple is right here. Four village women in stiff white lace headdresses and wooden clogs stand talking by a fence, a man ploughing behind them. He painted their traditional Breton dress with real care. This was his first trip to the region, still fairly gentle and true to life. The bolder, flatter Gauguin of glowing colour and heavy outlines was two years and one more Breton visit away.