About this work
Five Polynesian women populate a warm, compressed landscape — some seated to the left, a central standing figure with arms raised in supplication, and a pair moving toward the right edge of the canvas. To the far right, two women stand or walk toward the painting's edge: one in a dusky rose-pink dress with a coral head covering, her arm drawn across her chest; beside her, the fifth figure is bare-chested, a white cloth at her waist, her arm raised and extending beyond the frame.
Purple patches on the ground dissolve into raspberry pink and mauve, while a band of trees and vegetation recedes toward cobalt-blue mountains along the horizon — mountains that brush the top edge of the canvas, leaving only a narrow ivory-white sliver of sky between them.
The landscape is built with a matte surface and vertical brushstrokes that evoke lush foliage almost impressionistically, while the figures themselves are flatly painted and heavily outlined — the stylized manner Gauguin had developed years earlier in Brittany.
*The Invocation* is dated 1903, the year the painter died in an island hut on the Marquesas.
Shortly after completing the canvas, Gauguin died on the Marquesan island of Hiva Oa on May 9, 1903, and his body was laid to rest in the cemetery of the Catholic church visible in the painting's background.
Produced at the end of his life, the work occupies a unique place in his oeuvre, representing the culmination of his lifelong artistic experimentation and total dedication to his art.
Motifs from his Tahitian oeuvre recur here in concentrated form — most strikingly, the pose of the central praying figure recalls the most prominent figure in his masterpiece *Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?*, his 1897–98 meditation on the cycle of life.
*The Invocation* alludes to the clash between Christianity and traditional Polynesian religion — characterized by a complex pantheon of spirits, gods, and ancestors.
For the viewer, knowing little about Polynesian culture and religion, the specific nature of the prayer remains deliberately enigmatic: who or what is being invoked, and why?
On the wall, this painting rewards unhurried attention — it belongs in a reading room, a study, or any space where the light is warm and the pace is slow. The compression of the horizontal canvas and the deep, muted palette — those mauve grounds, cobalt peaks, and coral accents — make it neither loud nor passive; it holds its register quietly. Gauguin depicts a religious scene, one he most likely witnessed while living in Polynesia, and that quality of witnessed ritual gives the print an air of gravity
