Harmony of Christianity in Tahiti
In his paintings, however, Gauguin portrays the Christian missionary influence as first an integrated aspect of the Tahitian culture and then, gradually, as an enhancement to the old way of life in Tahiti, rather than depicting his Eden as a place destroyed by the missionary presence. For example, Gauguin described Ia Orana Maria (We Greet Thee, Mary), painted in 1891 and 1892, in this way in a letter dated March 1892: “An angel with yellow wings points out to two Tahitian women Mary and Jesus, also Tahitians” (qtd. Goldwater 100). In this case, Gauguin’s writing is congruent with his art. Indeed there is a Tahitian Mary and Jesus in the left of the painting, halos around their heads to symbolize their holiness. In the background, two half-naked Tahitian women are informed by an angel of the presence of the holy mother and child and they fold their hands in a Christian act of adoration. The Tahitian setting is as obvious as the Christian symbolism – the bright colors, the various amounts of clothing worn by the native women, the exotic fruit, and the tropical foliage. Bernard Denvir notes this blending in his book Gauguin: Letters from Brittany and the South Seas when he describes Ia Orana Maria as “a joyous and colorful fusion of Christian and Eastern symbolism” (Denvir 66). For Denvir, in this painting, the Christian symbolism and the natural Tahitian landscape are harmoniously integrated, a harmony unlikely to have been created by someone who felt that Christianity was destroying Tahiti, as Gauguin expressed in his writings.
Gauguin continued this harmonious integration in Te Nave Nave Fenua, painted in 1892, which further expresses the harmony of Christian symbolism into the natural beauty of the Tahitian landscape. In this painting, a Tahitian woman is depicted surrounded by the bright colors and tropical foliage visible in Ia Orana Maria. Set in Gauguin’s Eden, the Tahitian woman depicted in this painting can best be described as Gauguin’s version of Eve. Her arm is extended and fingers poised to pluck the forbidden fruit. The lizard with red wings speaking into her ear is representative of Satan, who in the Bible story encouraged Eve to eat the forbidden fruit. The setting and figures are still Tahitian yet the Biblical storyline remains. As was true of Ia Orana Maria, Gauguin paints a Tahiti where Christianity exists in harmony with native Tahitian culture rather than in opposition to it.
Moreover, in 1896, Gauguin began to suggest an enhancement of Tahitian culture by the Christian missionary presence that went beyond the way he had simply integrated Christianity and the Tahitian landscape in previous pieces or condemned it in his writings. Specifically, Gauguin depitcts a Tahitian nativity scene in both Be Be (The Nativity) and Te Tamari No Atua (Birth of Christ Son of God). In the former, the Tahitian Mary is holding Jesus as an angel looks over them in a stable filled with hay and animals, a scene quite reminiscent of the first Christmas except for the race of the characters. The simplicity of the surrounding intimates both the first Christmas and Gauguin’s Tahitian environment, suggesting an uncanny parallel between the two places. But the second painting varies more from the original nativity scene depicted in the Bible.
In this painting, Tahitian Mary lies on a bed, seemingly exhausted from the labors of childbirth. Beside her are two other women, one holding the baby Jesus, yet there are still animals visible in the background, much like in the previous Tahitian nativity scene. In both paintings, Gauguin crafted a scene that brought the heart of Christianity – the birth of Christ – to a Tahitian setting, pictorially depicting the function of the missionaries in Tahiti – bringing Christ to the Tahitians – in a harmonious manner rather than in the disruptive way suggested by Gauguin’s writings. It is important to note how this exposure of the Tahitians to Christ varies in these two paintings. In Be Be, the scene is distinctly a Biblical one with the only truly Tahitian figures being the figures of Mary, Jesus, and the angel. But in Te Tamari No Atua, the scene has changed. In this piece, the seamless blending of the Biblical scene into the background of a modern-day Tahiti suggests that the introduction of the Christian missionary influence in Tahiti was a seamless one with a smooth transition, a change that enhanced Tahiti rather than destroying it.