Vincent Van Gogh in Arles, St. Remy and Auvers, 1888-1890 PART III

In May 1890, after spending a year at the asylum in St. Remy, Van Gogh left Provence and moved to Normandy.  He wanted to be closer to his brother Theo, but he felt life in Paris would be too stressful. On the advice of fellow painter Camille Pissarro, Van Gogh found lodging in the small hamlet of Auvers-sur-Oise about 20 miles from Paris in the countryside. This would be Van Gogh’s last home.

           Vineyards with a View of Auvers, 1890, oil on canvas, Vincent Van Gogh.

Auvers was the home of painter Charles Francois Daubigny who built a house and studio there in 1857.  Cezanne, Monet, Pissarro, Daubigny, Corot and Gauguin were among the many artists who have portrayed the village of Auvers.  Now Van Gogh would paint the charming village full of thatched roof cottages and beautiful gardens.  Van Gogh would write, “Auvers is decidedly very beautiful.”

                     Daubigny's Garden, 1890, oil on canvas, Vincent Van Gogh

Van Gogh lived in Auvers the last 70 days of his life.  It was his most prolific time; he created 75 paintings and 50 drawings.  His subjects included the local landscape, gardens, Daubigny’s home and gardens, the town church, wheat fields and portraits of his physician Dr. Gachet, his family and other friends.

                            Vincent Van Gogh's room at the Ravoux Inn in Auvers.

Van Gogh lived in a small cell like room at the Ravoux Inn.  The inn and its café have been restored and are open to the public.  Van Gogh’s room was a small cell like space on the third floor illuminated by a small window.

                        Church at Auvers, 1890, oil on canvas, Vincent Van Gogh

On July 29, 1890 Van Gogh died of a gun shot wound to the chest, he was 37 years old. Van Gogh is buried in the cemetery in Auvers long side his brother Theo, who passed away six months later.

The National Gallery of Art recently acquired one of Van Gogh’s last paintings.  This stunning canvas, called Green Wheat Fields, Auvers bears the hallmaks of Van Gogh’s work- brilliant palette, rich impasto and energetic brushwork.

               Green Wheat Fields, Auvers, 1890, oil on canvas, Vincent Van Gogh

To learn more about visiting Auvers and the House and Studio of Vincent Van Gogh visit http://www.maisondevangogh.fr/en/.

Richard Diebenkorn, the Berkeley Years 1953-1966

I have always enjoyed the “Ocean Park” series of abstract paintings by Richard Diebenkorn (1922-1993). These paintings were done when Diebenkorn moved to Los Angeles and comprise his signature style. These large canvasses evoke the light and landscape of southern California.

                                        Ocean Park No. 54, 1972 oil on canvas.

While in San Francisco last month I had an opportunity to visit an exhibition of Diebenkorn’s early work, specifically the pieces created from 1953-1966 when he lived in Berkeley. The exhibition is at the de Young Museum in Golden Gate Park and is very comprehensive and enlightening. 

                                        Berkeley No. 13, 1954, oil on canvas.

                         

The earliest works in the exhibition are indeed abstract, graffiti like ink drawings, influenced by the abstract expressionists, specifically de Kooning. As time passes Diebenkorn’s work, much praised by the art community for its energetic, abstract qualities, becomes more figurative.

                                            Untitled (Berkeley), 1954, ink on paper.

 In 1955 he created “Chabot Valley” his first representational landscape. His shift to figurative work shocked the art world.  In 1957 Diebenkorn wrote, “Temperamentally perhaps I had always been a landscape painter.” He further commented, “Abstract literally means to draw from or separate.  In this sense every artist is abstract… a realistic or non-objective approach makes no difference.  The result is what counts.”

                                   Chabot Valley, 1955, oil on canvas.

Throughout these years Diebenkorn returns to drawing from the figure. His 1958 piece “Woman in Profile” uses energetic layers of impasto  to describe a woman. Diebenkorn paints the organic shapes of the figure and juxtaposes them to the landscape outside; the grid pattern of the windows unites the two worlds.

                                 Woman in Profile, 1958, oil on canvas.

Diebenkorn’s figure studies or “exercises in seeing” as he describes them reveal his thought process and works to come. While visiting Leningrad in 1965 his works take on a Matisse like quality using pattern and flat color. These works anticipate the “Ocean Park” series.

                           Recollections of a Visit to Leningrad, 1965, oil on canvas.

Diebenkorn is a unique American artist.  This exhibition of his early work enlightens and informs our undertsanding of his signature work. I highly recommend a visit to the de Young Museum for this impressive exhibition.The exhibition catalog, with essays by Emma Acker, Steven A. Nash and Timothy Anglin Burgard, is excellent.