In January 2015, Paul Gauguin’s Nafea faa ipoipo (1892) sold for $300 million to an unidentified buyer in Qatar. After 98 years in the same family – and 68 years on loan to The Kunstmuseum Basel – Nafea will disappear from public view in January 2016. The installation is part homage to the mysterious painting (with its Buddhist hand signals, enigmatic portraits, and vivid-but-flattened landscape). And a series of questions What does it mean for a painting to be loved and lost? How can we know what something, or someone, is worth, when its image is infinitely reproducible?

Why are you leaving? Where are you going? Will you come back?
The Reading Room, Dallas.  June 16 – July 11, 2015

Why are you leaving? Where are you going? Will you come back?
Woodcut on paper, edition of 15, unique
16 x 11.5 inches each

Why are you leaving? Where are you going? Will you come back?
Woodcut on paper, edition of 15, unique
16 x 11.5 inches, with detail

Will You Come Back? (Souvenir)
Eight-page newspaper, edition of 1000
23 x 30 inches

Why are you leaving? Where are you going? Will you come back?
Every book featuring Nafea faa Ipoipo on the cover
Centerfold, 8-page newspaper, unlimited edition

click to enlarge