To: Theo van Gogh
Date: Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, on or about Friday, 20 September 1889
(Source: Vincent van Gogh Letters)
My dear Theo,
[...]
I’m sending you a few canvases with the portrait, the following
Moonrise (wheatsheaves) (Wheatfield with sheaves and rising moon)
Study of fields (this study can be identified as Fields with poppies)
'' of olive trees (Olive trees with the Alpilles in the background)
Night study (Starry night)
The mountain (The Alpilles with a hut)
Field of green wheat (Wheatfield after a storm)
Olive trees (Olive grove)
Orchard in blossom (Orchard)
Entrance to a quarry (Entrance to a quarry)
Wheatfield with sheaves and rising moon
1889
The first four canvases are studies that don’t have the effect of an ensemble like the others. Myself I quite like the Entrance to a quarry which I did when I felt this attack beginning, because to my taste the dark greens go well with the ochre tones, there’s something sad in them that’s healthy, and that’s why it doesn’t annoy me. That’s perhaps also the case with the Mountain. People will tell me that mountains aren’t like that, and that there are black contours as wide as a finger. [...]
1889
The olive trees with white cloud and background of mountains, as well as the Moonrise and the Night effect – These are exaggerations from the point of view of the arrangement, their lines are contorted like those of the ancient woodcuts. [...]
Starry night
1889 When you say in your letter that I’ve never done anything but work, no – that’s not right – I myself am very, very discontented with my work, and the only thing that consoles me is that experienced people say that one must paint for 10 years for nothing. But what I’ve done is only those 10 years of unfortunate studies that didn’t come off. Now a better period could come, but I’ll have to strengthen the figure work, and I must refresh my memory by very close study of Delacroix, Millet. Then I’ll try to sort out my drawing. Yes, every cloud has a silver lining, it gives one more time for study. [...]
The Alpilles with a hut
1889 All in all the only things I consider a little good in it are the Wheatfield, the Mountain, the Orchard, the Olive trees with the blue hills and the Portrait and the Entrance to the quarry, and the rest says nothing to me, because it lacks personal will, feeling in the lines. Where these lines are close together and deliberate the painting begins, even if it may be exaggerated. [...]
Entrance to a quarry
1889
Do you know what I think about quite often – what I used to say to you back in the old days, that if I didn’t succeed I still thought that what I had worked on would be continued. Not directly, but one isn’t alone in believing things that are true. And what does one matter as a person then? I feel so strongly that the story of people is like the story of wheat, if one isn’t sown in the earth to germinate there, what does it matter, one is milled in order to become bread.
~
January, 12, 2010 - Van Gogh's Starry Night Named World's Most Popular Oil Painting of the Decade
overstockArt.com, the leader in handmade oil painting art reproductions, has officially released its Top 10 list of the most popular oil paintings from the past decade. Topping the list is Vincent van Gogh’s irrefutable magnum opus, "Starry Night". According to overstockArt.com’s statistics, Van Gogh’s total sales numbers have far exceeded those of any of the other great masters. (ArtDaily)
