A Rose a Day No.38

Vincent van Gogh, ‘Roses’ (1890).

Source: https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/436534

In a letter from May 1888, Vincent van Gogh, who had recently arrived in Arles, wrote of the painter Auguste Renoir to his brother Theo: ‘You will remember that we saw a magnificent garden of roses by Renoir. I was expecting to find subjects like that here….You would probably have to go to Nice to find Renoir’s garden again. I have seen very few roses here, though there are some, among them the big red roses called Rose de Provence.’ Van Gogh is referring to Rosa centifolia, the Centifolia or Cabbage Rose, which were especially grown in Provence in the region around Grasse as a cash-crop. As a Dutchman, van Gogh would no doubt have been delighted to learn that the ‘Rose de Provence’ is actually a ‘sport’ first nurtured in Europe by Dutch breeders. 

One year after the letter quoted, and now a voluntarily resident of the mental asylum in Saint-Rémy, van Gogh was more successful. Referring to the painting entitled ‘Roses’ (1890) which is shown above he wrote to Theo in May 1890: ‘I've just finished this canvas of pink roses against a yellow-green background in a green vase’, and he concludes the letter by announcing: ‘I feel absolutely serene, and the brushstrokes come to me and follow each other very logically.’ 

Unfortunately, the bold colours van Gogh applied have faded considerably, so that, for example, the bright red of the Damask Rose buds have become flesh-like, and the overall visual impact of seeing the ‘complementary colour’ contrast of red against the green background has been greatly reduced.