Nave nave fenua (Delightful Land) from Noa Noa (Fragrant Scent)

Paul Gauguin

1893–94

A multicolored woodcut by Paul Gauguin that condenses his late‑19th‑century vision of Tahiti—a solitary female figure and lush, stylized foliage meant to suggest the island’s sensual “delightful land.”

The image hits you with a dark, almost shadowy silhouette of the woman set against luminous, carved planes of yellow and ochre foliage, a decorative vertical border of Polynesian‑like motifs, and the raw, scratched texture of the woodcut that makes the scene feel both ornamental and primeval.

Part of Gauguin’s Noa Noa project, this print helped push the woodcut into modern expressive practice by combining Symbolist color and Polynesian imagery, influencing later artists’ use of simplified forms, bold contrasts, and non‑Western subjects.

Palette

Art Terms

Woodcut Print Post-Impressionism Symbolism Primitive art Figurative Landscape

Exhibitions

Summer Exhibition: Gauguin Woodcuts and Watercolors

1933

Gaugin and his Circle in Brittany: The Prints of the Pont-Aven School

1987

Prints by Gauguin, Vuillard, and Bonnard

1949

Arts of the South Seas

1946