Liberal Arts Blog — Van Gogh (1853–1890) “Cafe Terrace At Night,” (1888), “Starry Night Over The Rhone,” (1888), “The Starry Night,” (1889)
Liberal Arts Blog: Friday is the Joy of Art, Architecture, Design, Film, Fashion, and All Things Visual Day
Today’s Topic: Van Gogh (1853–1890) “Cafe Terrace at Night,” (1888), “Starry Night Over the Rhone,” (1888), “The Starry Night,” (1889)
Van Gogh painted many versions of starry nights. The three most famous are in three different cities.
His last version, “The Starry Night” (1889), a painting of the view from his room in the asylum at
St. Remy de Provence, is in New York City’s Museum of Modern Art. “Cafe Terrace at Night” (1888) is in the Kroller-Muller Museum in Otterlo, the Netherlands. And “Starry Night over the Rhone” (1888) is be savored in the Musee d’Orsay in Paris. Unfortunately, I have not yet been to Otterlo. Have you?
Were you disappointed? Or blown out of the water? Or somewhere in between?
Today, a few notes. What do you know about Van Gogh that the rest of us might not and would delight to learn?
Experts — please chime in. Correct, elaborate, elucidate.
CAFE TERRACE AT NIGHT (1888) Kroller-Muller Museum, Otterlo, Netherlands
1. Honestly, my favorite of the three. I love the balance of the cafe, the sky, the cobblestones, the hint of a city park, the waiter and the pedestrians.
2. The feeling evoked is one of joy at the fullness of life, at the sweetness of a summer night.
3. The contrasting yellow and the deep blue are in perfect harmony. A mesmerizing synchrony of color and shape. A moment seized. Immortalized.
NB: Painted in Arles, France in September 1888. Original title: “Cafe, le soir.” (Coffee House, the Evening). This is Van Gogh’s first painting with a starry sky.
In his own words: ‘This a night painting without black, with nothing but beautiful blue and violet and green and in this surrounding the illuminate area colors itself sulfur pale yellow and citron green.”
A scholar has argued that the painting is a “Symbolist’s Last Supper.” A stretch? spot on? (see first link below for details)
STARRY NIGHT OVER THE RHONE (1888) — Musee d’Orsay, Paris, the location is a few blocks from the “Yellow House” in which Van Gogh rented four rooms
1. Painted later, the same month, September 1888 in Arles. Fewer colors. One lone couple. Fewer details. But still peaceful.
2. “The sky is aquamarine, the water is royal blue, the ground is mauve. The town is blue and purple. The gas is yellow and the reflections are russet gold descending down to green-bronze. On the aquamarine field of the sky the Great Bear is a sparkling green and pink, whose discreet paleness contrasts with the brutal gold of the gas. Two colorful figurines of lovers in the foreground.” (Van Gogh)
3. Not actually what Van Gogh saw. “In reality, the view depicted in the painting faces away from Ursa Major, which is to the north.”
NB: Utterly enthralling.
THE STARRY NIGHT (1889) Museum of Modern Art, New York City, the view is from his room in the asylum at St. Remy de Provence
1. The village is imaginary. I sense a descent into madness. Disturbing.
2. “In the aftermath of the 23 December 1888 breakdown that resulted in the self-mutilation of his left ear, Van Gogh voluntarily admitted himself to the Saint-Paul-de-Mausole lunatic asylum on 8 May 1889.”
3. “Housed in a former monastery, Saint-Paul-de-Mausole catered to the wealthy and was less than half full when Van Gogh arrived, allowing him to occupy not only a second-story bedroom but also a ground-floor room for use as a painting studio.”
NB: Another painting from May 1889, is “Irises” (see fifth link below) Van Gogh shot himself in a field on July 27, 1890 and died two days later. He was 37 years old.
FOOTNOTE — one of his final paintings — May 1890 — “Road with Cypress and Star” also in the Kroller-Muller Museum in Otterlo
1. Last painting he did in St. Remy-de-Provence.
2. Do the two men represent Van Gogh’s need for companionship?
3. Was the brightness of the star inspired by the conjunction of Mercury and Venus on the 20th of April 1890, when they were only 3 degrees apart, giving the duo, the brightness of Sirius?
NB: Is the cypress in the center the “obelisk of death” — a foreboding of his own proximate demise?
Café Terrace at Night — Wikipedia
Starry Night Over the Rhône — Wikipedia
QUOTE OF THE MONTH
“Make your own Bible. Select and collect all the words and sentences that in all your readings have been to you like the blast of a trumpet.”
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
My spin — then periodically review, re-rank, and exchange your list with those you love. I call this the “Orion Exchange” because seven is about as many as any human can digest at a time. Game?
LAST FOUR YEARS OF POSTS ORGANIZED THEMATICALLY
Updating PDFs: 2023 — Google Drive
ATTACHMENTS BELOW:
#1 A graphic guide to justice (9 metaphors on one page).
#2 “39 Songs, Prayers, and Poems: the Keys to the Hearts of Seven Billion People” — Adams House Senior Common Room Presentation, (11/17/20)
NB: Palestine Orion (Decision) — let’s exchange Orions, let’s find Rumi’s field (“Beyond all ideas of right and wrong, there is a field. Meet me there” Rumi, 13 century Persian Sufi mystic)
YOUR TURN
Please share the coolest thing you learned recently or ever related to art, sculpture, design, architecture, film, or anything visual.
This is your chance to make some one else’s day. And to cement in your own memory something cool or important you might otherwise forget. Or to think more deeply than you otherwise would about something that is close to your heart.
