Autumn in Brittany (The Willow Tree)

Painted in 1889 at Pont-Aven or Le Pouldu, this autumn scene of a willow tree in the Breton countryside belongs to Gauguin's most intense period of Synthetist experimentation. He and Émile Bernard were developing their boldly simplified, symbolically charged approach to landscape, drawing on Japanese prints, medieval cloisonné, and primitivist ideas about essential forms. The willow tree — a traditional symbol of melancholy — is placed against the golden and russet tones of a Breton autumn landscape. Now at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City.

The willow is drawn with sweeping, calligraphic strokes that give it an almost Japanese ink-painting quality. Warm autumn tones fill the picture plane with a decorative mosaic of colour. Outlines are deliberate and defining. The sky is handled simply, without atmospheric elaboration, reinforcing the overall flat, iconic quality of the composition.