Month of Mary (Te avae no Maria)

'Te avae no Maria' (The Month of Mary) was painted in 1899 and is now in the Hermitage Museum, where it forms part of the collection's substantial Gauguin holdings. The Month of Mary refers to May, traditionally dedicated to the Virgin in Catholic practice, and Gauguin's title creates a characteristic fusion between Christian religious custom—which Tahiti had received through French missionary activity—and the Polynesian setting he depicted. The work belongs to his late Tahitian phase when his imagery was most complex in its layering of cultural references.

The composition places two figures within a landscape defined by flat color zones of deep green and ochre, the figures' forms simplified into the large, rounded shapes of Gauguin's mature style. The floral elements associated with May devotions are rendered as decorative pattern elements that integrate the figures into their setting.