Paul Gauguin

Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) was a French painter, sculptor, printmaker and ceramist who abandoned a career as a Paris stockbroker in the early 1880s to paint full time, encouraged by his friendship with Camille Pissarro and early exhibitions with the Impressionists. He soon broke from their style, developing a bolder, flatter use of color and simplified form that became known as Synthetism, working alongside artists at Pont-Aven in Brittany and later in Martinique.