Still Life with Chinese Peonies and Mandoline

In 1885 Paul Gauguin was not yet the painter of the South Seas. Two years earlier he had given up a steady job on the Paris stock exchange to paint full time; a move to Copenhagen with his Danish wife's family had just failed, and he was back in Paris with almost no money. This quiet interior belongs to that uncertain year, still close to the Impressionists he admired: a mandolin resting on a cloth, a jug of Chinese peonies, made more for himself than for any buyer. The canvas carries a later history too. During the Second World War it passed through a German museum, was recovered in Germany afterwards, and today hangs in the Musée d'Orsay under the code MNR 219, among the works the French national museums hold in trust until a rightful owner is found.