Tahiti, French Polynesia
Signed and dated 1928
Watercolor on paper, gold archival frame with museum glass
Framed: 15½ × 26¾ in. (39.4 × 67.9 cm)
Provenance: Galerie Api, Moorea, Tahiti; Gilles Artur, Director, Musée Gauguin, Papeete
William Alister MacDonald (1861–1956) was a Scottish-born watercolorist who settled in Tahiti in 1921 and spent the majority of his later life on the island and neighboring Moorea. Trained at St. Martin's School of Art in London and established through the Kensington Fine Arts Society, he brought a practiced British watercolor tradition to the documentation of Tahitian harbor and landscape subjects. This panoramic view of the Papeete waterfront, signed and dated 1928, was painted during his most productive Tahitian years, when he lived just outside the capital.
The composition extends horizontally across the picture plane, showing moored sailing vessels and harbor buildings reflected in calm water, with a single paddler in a small canoe occupying the middle distance. MacDonald's handling is confident and transparent, using reserved whites for sky and water highlights and building cloud formations with layered washes characteristic of the British plein-air tradition. The dual provenance: Galerie Api on Moorea and the collection of Gilles Artur, director of the Musée Gauguin, places this work within the primary institutional and commercial network for historical Tahitian art.
We ship free anywhere in the world, fully insured, packed by hand.
Tahiti, French Polynesia
Signed and dated 1928
Watercolor on paper, gold archival frame with museum glass
Framed: 15½ × 26¾ in. (39.4 × 67.9 cm)
Provenance: Galerie Api, Moorea, Tahiti; Gilles Artur, Director, Musée Gauguin, Papeete
William Alister MacDonald (1861–1956) was a Scottish-born watercolorist who settled in Tahiti in 1921 and spent the majority of his later life on the island and neighboring Moorea. Trained at St. Martin's School of Art in London and established through the Kensington Fine Arts Society, he brought a practiced British watercolor tradition to the documentation of Tahitian harbor and landscape subjects. This panoramic view of the Papeete waterfront, signed and dated 1928, was painted during his most productive Tahitian years, when he lived just outside the capital.
The composition extends horizontally across the picture plane, showing moored sailing vessels and harbor buildings reflected in calm water, with a single paddler in a small canoe occupying the middle distance. MacDonald's handling is confident and transparent, using reserved whites for sky and water highlights and building cloud formations with layered washes characteristic of the British plein-air tradition. The dual provenance: Galerie Api on Moorea and the collection of Gilles Artur, director of the Musée Gauguin, places this work within the primary institutional and commercial network for historical Tahitian art.
We ship free anywhere in the world, fully insured, packed by hand.
