Émile Marae a Tai Gauguin (1899-1980) - Nature Morte Tahitienne Tahiti (Vendu sans prix de réserve)

We present an oil on canvas depicting a Tahitian still life with leaves and stylized objects by Émile Marae a Tai Gauguin (1899–1980)

The composition combines large exotic leaves with an arrangement of geometricized objects, evoking the Polynesian world associated with Tahiti. The painting is monogrammed at the lower right,

Title: Tahitian Still Life with Leaves

Medium: Oil on canvas, unstretched

Artist: Émile Marae a Tai Gauguin (1899–1980), illegitimate son of Paul Gauguin in Tahiti

Artwork dimensions: 56.5 × 68 cm

Condition: Fair condition, small traces of creasing

Émile Marae a Tai Gauguin (1899–1980) was the Polynesian son of the famous Post-Impressionist painter Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) and his Tahitian partner Pau'ura a Tai (Tehura). Having grown up in Tahiti without any real European academic training, he turned to artistic creation later in life, asserting his father’s aesthetic and symbolic legacy. His work, often signed with the monogram “EG” visible on this canvas, reimagines the master’s primitivist and Synthetic vocabulary. This painting illustrates his appropriation of South Seas motifs: a carved figure evoking the *tiki* or the sacred structures of Polynesian *marae* is combined with stylized tropical vegetation defined by bold contours. Straddling ancestral memory, filial homage, and naïve art, his work offers a singular testament to the continuation of the Tahitian imagination in the 20th century.