Musée des Beaux-Arts de Pont-Aven

Pont-Aven is a small town on the Aven river in southern Finistère, a place of granite houses, old water mills and flower-filled quays, and in the late nineteenth century it became the cradle of a movement in painting. The Musée des Beaux-Arts de Pont-Aven, opened in 1985, is dedicated to the Pont-Aven School and to the artists who worked in and around the town. It stands in the centre, beside the river, and is the place to understand why this corner of Brittany mattered to modern art.

Paul Gauguin first came to Pont-Aven in 1886, looking for a place that was cheap, remote and untouched by the pace of Paris, and he returned in 1888 and 1889. He lodged at the Pension Gloanec, the inn run by Marie-Jeanne Gloanec, where many artists stayed. Around him gathered younger painters such as Émile Bernard and Paul Sérusier. In 1888 Gauguin urged Sérusier to paint what he saw with pure colour and simplified shapes, which led to a small landscape painted on a cigar-box lid in the Bois d'Amour woods, known as the Talisman. This tiny painting inspired the Nabis, and the style that grew from the discussions of Pont-Aven, called Synthetism, flattened forms and used strong outlines and unnatural colours. Gauguin's famous Yellow Christ, now in a museum in the United States, was inspired by a wooden crucifix in the chapel of Trémalo, near the town.

The museum's permanent collection presents the works of the Pont-Aven group, including paintings by Gauguin, Bernard, Sérusier and Maurice Denis, as well as other artists who visited, among them painters from the Netherlands and other countries. Denis's Maternity at Pouldu and his later Bather at Port-Blanc are among the pieces listed. The galleries are lit with care, and an audiovisual presentation sets the scene. Temporary exhibitions explore the work of the school and of artists linked to it, and often tackle neglected figures, such as the women sculptors of the early twentieth century. The museum offers audio guides, video guides in sign language and access for guide dogs.

A visit takes about an hour. Combine it with a walk along the river, where the old mills stand, and a trip to the Bois d'Amour. The town is also known for its butter biscuits, the galettes de Pont-Aven, sold in many shops.

The museum suits art lovers, those who follow Gauguin's footsteps and anyone visiting southern Brittany. The Le Pouldu beach, where Gauguin later painted, is a short drive away.