Master paintings of the 1800s at the Bishop Museum

For the final project in the Painting II class I teach, students select a painting of a master to copy using the grid system and painting section by section. The unveiling was yesterday at the Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum.

Nancy Alejo chose Camille Pissarro’s “The Red Roofs,” 1877, and Bernadette Chan picked Paul Gauguin’s “Parau api (Two Women of Tahiti),” 1892.

“The Red Roofs” by Nancy Alejo after Camille Pissarro

A segment of “Parau api (Two Women of Tahiti)” by Bernadette Chan after Paul Gauguin

My students selected these works independently from each other, but in their presentation, we learned that Pissarro and Gauguin became friends in 1873 and painted together. Pissarro painted with the Impressionists. Gauguin had no formal art training, and his work is post-Impressionist, flat, hard edged and considered symbolic. Pissarro gave money to Gauguin to go to Tahiti.

While at the Bishop Museum we visited The Picture Gallery on the top floor of the entrance tower of Hawaiian Hall. My favorite paintings were the landscapes by D. Howard Hitchcock and the still lifes of fruit dear to my heart (because I have had mountain apples and breadfruit in my own garden) by Margaret Girvin Gillian.

The Picture Gallery at the Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum. Fascinating old images of Hawaii may be viewed here.

If you go:
See www.bishopmuseum.org for how to get there and for ticket information. Admission is free on Pauahi’s birthday, Dec. 19.
From Waikiki you may take the No. 2 bus and ask the driver to let you off on School street at Kapalama street. Walk downhill toward the ocean to Bernice street and turn right to the entrance at 1525 Bernice Street.