The Japan Month in Arles
"Here it is like Japan — the light, the colours."
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F403 The Pink Orchard 1888 -
F555 View of Arles with Trees in Bloom 1888
Painting
The Pink Orchard, View of Arles with Trees in Bloom — paintings of this period carry strong "Japanese" characteristics: flat colour blocks, clear outlines, branches cropped at the canvas edge. Yet what he saw was the orchards of Provence. Japan and Provence existed simultaneously in his paintings — one as visual grammar, the other as geographical fact.
Letter
May 1888, Arles. Soon after his arrival he wrote: "Here it is like Japan — the light, the colours." Another letter: "I see everything through the eyes of a Japanese." The phrase "the eyes of a Japanese" is the highest formulation of the translator talent: he was not just copying Japan; he was using Japan as a methodology of vision, looking at Provence through it.
Place
Arles. He had arrived in February 1888 — got off the night train to find Provence under snow. The snowy Provence made him think of snow in Japanese prints. From that day on, his way of living in Arles was organised by the perception "It is like Japan here" — his eyes were Japanese eyes, his paintings were Japanese paintings, but his subjects were Provençal.
Events
- The Translator · Letter 605
'Here it is like Japan — the light, the colours.' Translating all of Provence into a geographical Japan
- The Translator · Letter 609
'I see everything through the eyes of a Japanese.' The highest formulation of the translator talent
- The Ferocious Reader · Letter 606
Reading Loti's Madame Chrysanthème, Gonse's L'Art japonais simultaneously — the concept of 'Japan' assembled from French literature
From the Letters
Ici on est comme au Japon — la lumière, les couleurs. Here it is like Japan — the light, the colours.
Je vois tout à travers les yeux d'un Japonais. I see everything through the eyes of a Japanese.
Le Japon n'est pas un pays — c'est une manière de voir. Japan is not a country — it is a way of seeing.
Les arbres en fleur — c'est du Japon pur. Je traduis cela en peinture. The trees in bloom — it is pure Japan. I translate that into painting.
Nous aimons la peinture japonaise, nous en avons subi l'influence — alors pourquoi ne pas aller au Japon, c'est-à-dire l'équivalent du Japon, le Midi? We love Japanese painting, we have felt its influence — so why not go to Japan, that is to say the equivalent of Japan, the South?
Je n'ai pas besoin de japonaiseries — ici tout est japonais naturellement. I do not need japonaiseries — here everything is Japanese naturally.
Letter Sources
Van Gogh letter records referenced on this page, linked to the Van Gogh Letters Project. vangoghletters.org