Paul Gauguin (1894). Mahana No Atua (Day of the God) [oil on canvas]. The Art Institute of Chicago.

Gauguin has grounded this work firmly in the right side of the semi-abstract portion of the abstraction scale. A specific and decorative way of figure modeling, combined with a peaceful, chromatic color palette, creates the nearest visual equivalent possible to experiencing a sun-bathed Hawaiian (correction: Tahitian) beach. Relying on flattened shapes, Gauguin has composed a remarkable impression of three-dimensional space through relative size, edge and detail blending, and the before-mentioned modelling. 

A sense of calm, lateral movement is created by the forms that seem to float in the expanses of the water and sky. In this way, a sense of peaceful eternity is referenced. Weightless color formats the canvas, verging on subjectivity to communicate the warm calm of the scene. Attention clearly focuses on the three young figures in the dead-center of the canvas, but the shadow-like density of the deity-figure quickly draws focus and infuses the emotional content of this work with a sense of the supernatural. Forms of similar density and varying states of definition are distributed across the canvas intermingling with spirit-like masses of light color. 

The central figure coyly or innocently gazes at the observer, placing her or him at a slightly elevated point relative to her position. Like Cassatt’s Maternal Caress, Eastern influences are discoverable in how forms are formatted with contour lines and a colorful ink-wash style. A form of balance is struck in how the only artificial form in the composition has a sense of mass that contradicts the light feel of the rest of the canvas which is populated by natural forms. 

Gauguin is expressing the simple and pure beauty of living in a world untouched by the influence of impersonal, mechanical and masculine western culture. Formally and pictorially, the women of the scene live in a warm, unpressured world of balance and harmony with their benevolent deity. In fact, the world of reality and that of the spiritual blend together in an assumed, instinctual way. In this way Mahana No Atua becomes a conceptual rather than perceptual work of art.