Gauguin and Van Gogh Meet the Ninth Art

This article analyses how a late twentieth-century/early twenty-first-century development in bandes dessinées, which combines historical novels with biographies, expresses paradoxical attitudes towards mythologies surrounding Paul Gauguin and Vincent Van Gogh. Firstly, I demonstrate that the paradox stems from a simultaneous desire for and suspicion of master narratives, identified as intrinsic to postmodernism by Linda Hutcheon. Then I establish how eight graphic novels perpetuate pre-existing mythological master narratives about Gauguin and Van Gogh. Nevertheless, those mythologies simultaneously arouse scepticism: myths do not express exemplary universal truths; myths are artificial and fictionalised constructs whose status in reality is dubious. The albums convey tension between desire and suspicion regarding myths by a variety of devices. These include sequenced panels, circular plots, unreliable witnesses, fictional insertions, parodies and mock realism.