Despite Tahiti, Gauguin leaves me cold

As unfashionable as it is to admit, I've never been a fan of the Impressionists. I understand the point of their work and respect the revolution they sparked. I find some of their work attractive. But with limitless money, would I put their canvasses on my walls? Nope. Give me some conservative old masters any day.

You'll guess, therefore, that I was pre-disposed not to like the Gauguin show now on at Tate Modern. I wouldn't have sought it out on my own. (Especially not with a British Museum exhibit on the Book of the Dead, and Canaletto at the National Gallery to draw my attention. Both need a look in.) We went because it was the hottest ticket in town, my visiting mother wanted to see it and it was a good excuse to meet up with friends.

As exhibitions go, they've done a fine job. It tells a cohesive and comprehensive story, taking you through Gauguin's whole career by chunking it into thematic categories. Thus you don't have a chronological experience, but explore ideas like "making the familiar strange" and "the eternal feminine". There are a lot of pictures here, and the curators have certainly worked to get a comprehensive view; even if you think you know the artist, I suspect you'll find a lot you've never seen. They expand beyond paintings to documents, sculpture (Gauguin was quite a woodworker) and quirky objects he incorporated into his paintings. The descriptions are informative without either talking down or being too intellectual. The display space is well lit, allows for plenty of circulation and didn't seem too crowded, despite the show being sold out.

So why didn't the show excite me more? First, I'm simply not a fan of most of the art. We associate Gauguin most with his Tahitian paintings, but I'll wager when you call them to mind you're imposing some of your own cheerful, colourful impressions of the place. Many of his Tahitian paintings are dark, brooding and profoundly disturbing. In fact, you can say that about his paintings overall. There's canvas after canvas heavy with gloomy browns, acid yellows and sickly greens. His is a brooding, unwelcoming world. And too often there's something going on in the painting that sends shivers down your spine. A menacing figure in the background, a naked woman making love to a fox, or the portrait of his dreaming son with menacing black crows flapping above him. I went to the show with the impression that Van Gogh was the troubled one and Gauguin more sane, I came out thinking Gaugin was a complete nutter ... a dangerously warped and troubled soul.

There was a small handful of paintings I liked. One or two of the Tahitian canvases are simply an appreciation of the beauty of the island people. Those are stunning. My favourite canvasses barely get a not in the show's promotional material: they're simple French landscapes and scenes of French peasants bringing in the harvest in a lovely, golden world. But there were too few of these amongst the stuff that made you think.

My thoughts focused not only on the disturbing nature of the scenes, but on what an unpleasant man Gauguin seemed to be. From leaving his wife and children to having paedophilic relationships with those native girls to abusing his paying customers ... the man was a jerk. To me this is made clear by one of the most fascinating scenes in the exhibition: the facade of his studio. He created a Tahitian long house, covered with carved panels with images bordering on the pornographic and incendiary statements, then placed the studio so any visitor had to cross through his much used bedroom. Tracy Emin, eat your heart out. Don't get me wrong, the carving was exquisite and the facade is undeniably a precious work of art. But I couldn't appreciate it without considering a context that was so patently about making people feel uncomfortable. And discomfort, I'm afraid, is just not what I want from my art.

The evening achieved its primary objective, however, which was to give my mother a nice night out with friends. To that end, we wandered upstairs after the exhibition to have dinner in the museum restaurant. This is one of the most attractive spaces in London, seven stories up, glass walled, directly on the river overlooking St. Paul's. It's no value for money ... £11 for a small plate of pasta, for example ... but the food is tasty and the wine list is surprisingly reasonable. The main inspiration is Mediterranean and tapas, which works well at a destination restaurant that's more about socialising and the view than the food.