Self-Portrait with the Yellow Christ

Self-Portrait with the Yellow Christ is an 1890 or 1891 painting by Paul Gauguin, produced in Pont-Aven in Brittany and now in the musée d'Orsay in Paris, to which it was assigned after its purchase by the French state in 1994 with financial assistance from Philippe Meyer and a Japanese patron.
The artist shows himself between two of his own artworks, The Yellow Christ and a grotesque ceramic self-portrait – he often used Christ as a symbol for himself and thus the work fulfilled his desire to create a triple self-portrait.

History

When the artist began the canvas he had been in Pont-Aven for two years. He produced the work just before leaving for Tahiti. The work is one of several on religious themes from the same period, making him the "original core of Symbolism in painting" – it also included The Yellow Christ and The Green Christ. Initially in the collection of Gauguin's friend Daniel de Monfreid, it had entered Ambroise Vollard's gallery by 1902. It was acquired by Maurice Denis in 1903.