1888 · 10 Gogh.art nodes
Van Gogh in Arles: Paintings, Night Scenes and the Yellow House
Van Gogh arrived in Arles in 1888. Its strong light, streets, nights and yellows became a concentrated field of experiment: sunflowers, the Yellow House, night scenes and the Roulin family belong to the same place.
- The Translator
- The Colour Experimenter
- Synaesthetic Precision
- The Copyist
- The Ferocious Reader
Long-tail intents
- Van Gogh Arles paintings
- Van Gogh Arles night paintings
- Van Gogh Yellow House and Sunflowers
Reading this place
Light, colour and decoration
Arles was not the start of one style, but a place where colour was organized as a set of relations. The sunflower series pushes yellow toward a near-monochrome range, while the Yellow House joins painting, living and artistic friendship in one space.
The city at night
Starry Night Over the Rhone, Cafe Terrace at Night and The Night Cafe place artificial light, stars and social night life under different pictorial conditions. They are Arles works, but they do not reduce the city to a prehistory of The Starry Night.
Key artwork paths
Common questions
When did Van Gogh arrive in Arles?
Van Gogh arrived in Arles in 1888, the year that produced the Sunflowers, major night scenes and the Yellow House project.
Which famous paintings are connected with Arles?
Sunflowers, The Bedroom, Cafe Terrace at Night and Starry Night Over the Rhone are all connected with the Arles period.
Why is the Arles period important?
It brought intense colour, night scenes, interiors and Van Gogh's idea of artists living and working together into the same painting project.
Sources
Orchards in Bloom
At the best of his time in Arles he felt it himself — but he did not know what to call it.
- The Translator
- The Colour Experimenter
The Sunflower Decoration
He painted the welcome ahead of time, and then waited for it to be seen.
- The Colour Experimenter
- The Ferocious Reader
The Roulin Family
He was not painting himself an imagined family — he was painting, for the few who really stayed, a kind of portrait that could let a relationship remain.
- The Colour Experimenter
- The Copyist
Starry Night over the Rhône
At night, by gaslight, before the night sky, he painted the night. That alone should not be left out.
- The Colour Experimenter
- The Ferocious Reader
The Yellow House
The imagination he spent on the Yellow House lasted far longer than the house itself.
- The Colour Experimenter
- Synaesthetic Precision
The Night Café
"It is one of the ugliest pictures I have done." Those are his own words, from the letter.
- Synaesthetic Precision
- The Colour Experimenter
Gauguin Arrives
Two painters look at the same scene and paint two completely different worlds. This matters more than what came after — but what came after covered it over.
- The Colour Experimenter
- The Ferocious Reader
The Bedroom
He painted the same room three times: once living inside it, twice already gone.
- The Colour Experimenter
- Synaesthetic Precision
La Berceuse
He kept designing what others would feel on seeing his pictures — only the "others" grew harder and harder to have present.
- The Colour Experimenter
- The Copyist
Gauguin Leaves
After that night, the Yellow House's plan for a shared community was over. Soon after leaving the hospital he picked up the brush again.
- Synaesthetic Precision
- The Colour Experimenter