1888-10 · Arles · Knot of Intention

The Bedroom

He painted the same room three times: once living inside it, twice already gone.

  1. Vincent van Gogh, The Bedroom, 1888, Arles
    F482 The Bedroom 1888
  2. Vincent van Gogh, The Bedroom, 1889, Arles
    F484 The Bedroom 1889
  3. Vincent van Gogh, The Bedroom (third version), 1889, Arles
    F484b The Bedroom (third version) 1889

Painting

Oil on canvas, three versions. Walls pale violet, floor red tiles, bed and chairs fresh butter yellow, sheet lemon green, pillow lemon yellow, window green, washstand orange. He listed every colour in his letter — like a recipe. No shadow, no modelling, flat tints. He said it should be painted "like Japanese prints."

Letter

October 1888, Arles. "This time it's just simply my bedroom, only here colour is to do everything. Giving by its simplification a grander style to things, to be suggestive here of rest or of sleep in general." He painted three versions — the first in Arles, the next two in Saint-Rémy after the first was water-damaged. Repainting was not copying; it was rebuilding from memory.

Place

The Yellow House, upstairs. The window gave onto Place Lamartine; outside it, the station and the small green bridge. This was the first room he had ever owned outright — at thirty-five, after a decade of rented corners and other people's attics. He painted it the month before Gauguin came, repainted it twice from memory after the house was already lost.

before

The Yellow House needed a room that could put a person at ease, and he made a painting of that room.

now

He wrote a great deal about this picture — he wanted to paint a settled sense of rest (le repos absolu), in flat, plain tints, with nothing superfluous in the whole room, the idea pared to the simplest. He later painted three versions: the original in Arles, October 1888, plus two replicas from Saint-Rémy in September 1889.

after

Each time he repainted it, it was because the original was, in some sense, no longer beside him. By the time of the last two, he was no longer living in that room.

Events

  1. The Colour Experimenter · Letter 705

    A few days before Gauguin's arrival, Vincent decided to paint his own bedroom — a painting 'for the guest,' awaiting Gauguin's entry into the space

  2. The Colour Experimenter · Letter 705

    Wrote the colour formula for the entire painting in a letter: 'The walls are pale violet. The floor is of red tiles. The wood of the bed and chairs is the yellow of fresh butter.'

  3. The Translator · Letter 705

    'No shadow, no modelling, painted in flat tints like Japanese prints.' Japanese visual grammar explicitly written into the method of the Bedroom

  4. Synaesthetic Precision · Letter 705

    Declaration: 'Colour is to do everything here, giving by its simplification a grander style to things, suggestive of rest or sleep.'

  5. The Copyist · Letter 709

    In the Saint-Rémy asylum he repainted the Bedroom — version two. The original had been damaged by a flood; he reproduced it from memory. Repainting itself became a motif

  6. The Copyist · Letter 710

    Painted a smaller third version of the Bedroom — a gift for his sister Wil. The same subject three times, colours retuned, proportions revised

From the Letters

Cette fois-ci c'est tout simplement ma chambre à coucher, seulement la couleur doit ici faire la chose, et en donnant par sa simplification un style plus grand aux choses, être suggestive ici du repos ou du sommeil en général.

This time it's just simply my bedroom, only here colour is to do everything, and giving by its simplification a grander style to things, is to be suggestive here of rest or of sleep in general.

Letter 705
Les murs sont d'un violet pâle. Le sol est à carreaux rouges. Le bois du lit et les chaises sont jaune beurre frais.

The walls are pale violet. The floor is of red tiles. The wood of the bed and chairs is the yellow of fresh butter.

Letter 705
Pas d'ombre, pas de modelé, cela doit être peint en aplat comme les crépons japonais.

No shadow, no modelling, it should be painted in flat tints like Japanese prints.

Letter 705

Letter Sources

Van Gogh letter records referenced on this page, linked to the Van Gogh Letters Project. vangoghletters.org

Technique Evidence

This work appears as evidence in this site’s technique-evolution axis.

  1. The Shattering Stroke 1888.02 – 1889.05 Open period F482 / JH1608 The Bedroom Brushstroke Representative of directional brushwork