Paul Gauguin (French, 1848-1903) spent the last decade of his life painting in the South Seas, the climatic chapter in the life of, as he called himself, "a savage from Peru."Three years before setting sail for Tahiti, Gauguin had reduced modeling to a minimum in his drawings and paintings: he relied exclusively on line and color."Look at the Japanese who draw so admirably," he wrote to a friend, "and you will see life in the open air and in the sun without any shadows...Shadows are the sun"s trompe l"oeil, so I am inclined to suppress them."