Van Gogh

Subject matter

This painting shows a field or a garden of flowers, iris'. Van Gogh painted this whilst he was living in the Saint Paul-de-Mausole asylum in France.

He was influenced by the japanese wood-blok style Ukiyo-e, as were many of the post-impressionist artists at the time.

Technique

This, oil on canvas, piece is done with very hard, rough brush marks, as was most of his later work, with the shapes of the grass, leaves and flowers outlined, very similar to the Ukiyo-e Japanese wood-block prints, a movement that marked the impressionists. These markings give the painting a thick, relief texture.

The painting is a mix of mainly cool colours, the impact of the blue irises, and a transition into a more warmer feel, the brown-green soil and the marigolds in the background, also the mint coloured leaves that’s just between a bright yellow and a cool blue. This combination gives the piece as a whole a cool summer ambiance.

Vincent uses a very detailed show of folding, as clothes would drape on a figure, these flower’s petals droop on their age.

The perspective is as if he were the same height of the irises, or drawing them from a low point of view. There’s a show of depth in this piece as the less-detailed marigolds fade into the background.

Artist's Career

Van Gogh started painting peasants and landscapes in dark, earthy tones whilst the Impressionist movement was beginning to rise with bright and vivid colours, making his work more difficult to sell.  It was his younger brother Théo that told him to continue his work with brighter colours. 
In his brief career he sold only one of his paintings. His most valid and praised works are said to have been done during the last 3 years of his life. 

Links with own work

Van Gogh has a particular way of painting. Like most of the impressionists, the brush marks are very thick & rough. Although most of my work is light, I try to maintain a bright colour theme & I choose mainly landscapes & portraits as I find them more challenging and fun. Also, I out-line most of the basic shapes in my pieces, mainly with a fine liner or a thick marker depending on the object contrary to Van Gogh's as he out-lines his main objects with a darker shade of the filling colours.  I find the Impressionist movement, in general, an inspiration for most of my experimental and leisure works as I find the technique & style of their paintings to be so free, yet carefully placed.

Quotations

"[It] strikes the eye from afar. The Irises are a beautiful study full of air and life."- Theo Van Gogh