(From Art and Man, 3rd ed, page 173: "...for instance, an artist such as a painter will work out the same theme or landscape dozens of times with many variations. A sketchbook belonging to the same artist may contain pages dedicated to faces, still more to a certain shape of hip or nose, others seem obsessed with eyes. Finished paintings or drawings are no exception, and critics go mad with questions about the repetition -- with the simple answer: the artist does not finish a theme at one stroke; variety dances in the mind.")
These two works are the sole pieces of art in the apartment. Indeed, this was done purposely by the single occupant, an artist studying at the university nearby, to bring focus, to allow mental space. Many days and nights the paintings stare at the thin student, red-rimmed eyes staring back.
Two sources of light illuminate the room. One is the light that slants in from the sun or moon through a window opposite the only door; the other is a lamp in a corner with a faded shade. Neither source touches van Gogh's work directly, again, by design, yet they still reveal the wild lines and impossible shapes.
A couch keeps its back to the paintings. Here, a blanket hangs off a worn arm and the pillow next to it holds its indentation like a meaningless note from a lover. There was a mirror at one time that faced the couch; now it sits on the floor, its glass turned to the wall. The metal wire it hung on is intact, mostly, with one end frayed by a sudden pressure. One corner of the backing is ripped where a finger slipped into it.
There's a kitchenette under the window. Direct sunlight falls onto a dish towel that hangs over the edge of a sink; the bluebirds sewn in rows have been worn down to a sky-like color where the light touches them. Off the side of the sink there is one bird yet bright blue, and he flies next to a grease stain the shape of a toothpick. Mugs and glasses are stacked high enough to look over the towel and into the room.
No cupboards. A portable fold-up wall hides the toilet. Two stacks of clothes, one by the couch, the other leaning on the bathroom partition.
Immigrant dust does not fear displacement. In columns and brief swirls from the hall, it comes to settle here and there. Accumulates with the years. Stacks of books behind the couch house their share of dust; often, when our student isn't pressed close to the wall, these stacks serve as a makeshift chair.
The paintings' frames are wiped daily along with the piles of sand, the lampost; slowly, carefully, the wild branches that look more like the arms of wailing women than limbs of trees.
Woven in three strands of sea green, a rug holds the particles of time, yes, but more: two indentations that could be eyes, for here a pair of knees fall when the hours stretch and the shadow of day lengthens, yet Saint-Remy calls.
A large lamp stands directly behind the chair and sometimes heats the cheek of the artist on late nights. Now the bulb is cold. An easel sits opposite the light; it supports 29 x 56 1/2 inches of the sky -- if one looks closely, so the nose almost touches the canvas, the eyes are fooled and the nape of the neck feels the chill of a breeze.
To the side and somewhat behind the easel, a table shrinks away from the window. A piece of paper the color of a faded pink linoleum floor rests here; toward the top, written in a hasty hand, is a list long forgotten: brushes; paint; coffee and sardines; the address of the laundromat. Below the list floats a sailboat sketched with the nub of a pencil, charcoal clouds above. The color of the paper suggests the sun has slipped under the clouds for a moment before the lapping darkness is complete.
The kitchenette; the towel with the bluebirds; glasses in the sink.
A partition to hide the toilet.
Books nestled into the back of the couch.
The Road Menders and its sibling.
On the couch lays the artist. Awake but still. Hands knitted behind head. Crossed legs draped over the arm. But now the legs are drawn in, and in a moment our student sits up; the hands separate, one sent through the hair, the other retrieves a pencil. A sketchbook materializes. Peripheral vision in the left eye can't unsee the two roads hanging there on the wall, and an intimate knowledge circles back and, beginning with the hand drawing a grey bucket, this understanding seeps up the arm and into the mind: tonight will be a night of sounds.
Stillness. A breath and a closing of the eyes. The treetops move as one in the soft wind, and every tree moves in step; the ancient ones moan and shudder. Footsteps on soft ground, some close, others -- in pairs -- echo off the sand piles and weave between the tree trunks. An unseen bird calls for its mate, and then calls again. Wheels turn and complain. Men shout, but their voices trail off and are lost, overtaken by the scratch of digging tools and the tink, tink, tink of a chisel.
Dreams and sounds walk hand in hand up the worn steps of night, and there they will comune in a dance-like whirl until the sun spills upon the feet of the expectant easel.
1.
An old studio apartment. The plaster walls on three sides are bare and uncleaned, but the fourth, however, holds two paintings -- copies of what at first look like the same scene. Closer inspection reveals they differ slightly, and those who know van Gogh's technique will recognize his work. Both done in 1889, the paintings share a common title, though some have given an extra name to the second to distinguish it from the first: The Road Menders and The Large Plane Trees (Road Menders at Saint-Remy).These two works are the sole pieces of art in the apartment. Indeed, this was done purposely by the single occupant, an artist studying at the university nearby, to bring focus, to allow mental space. Many days and nights the paintings stare at the thin student, red-rimmed eyes staring back.
Two sources of light illuminate the room. One is the light that slants in from the sun or moon through a window opposite the only door; the other is a lamp in a corner with a faded shade. Neither source touches van Gogh's work directly, again, by design, yet they still reveal the wild lines and impossible shapes.
A couch keeps its back to the paintings. Here, a blanket hangs off a worn arm and the pillow next to it holds its indentation like a meaningless note from a lover. There was a mirror at one time that faced the couch; now it sits on the floor, its glass turned to the wall. The metal wire it hung on is intact, mostly, with one end frayed by a sudden pressure. One corner of the backing is ripped where a finger slipped into it.
There's a kitchenette under the window. Direct sunlight falls onto a dish towel that hangs over the edge of a sink; the bluebirds sewn in rows have been worn down to a sky-like color where the light touches them. Off the side of the sink there is one bird yet bright blue, and he flies next to a grease stain the shape of a toothpick. Mugs and glasses are stacked high enough to look over the towel and into the room.
No cupboards. A portable fold-up wall hides the toilet. Two stacks of clothes, one by the couch, the other leaning on the bathroom partition.
Immigrant dust does not fear displacement. In columns and brief swirls from the hall, it comes to settle here and there. Accumulates with the years. Stacks of books behind the couch house their share of dust; often, when our student isn't pressed close to the wall, these stacks serve as a makeshift chair.
The paintings' frames are wiped daily along with the piles of sand, the lampost; slowly, carefully, the wild branches that look more like the arms of wailing women than limbs of trees.
Woven in three strands of sea green, a rug holds the particles of time, yes, but more: two indentations that could be eyes, for here a pair of knees fall when the hours stretch and the shadow of day lengthens, yet Saint-Remy calls.
2.
The smell of work. Rags smeared with paint lay in piles next to a chair, some resemble shirts and are reworn on occasion. Close by, on the far side of the rags, a stack of canvases; on the near side lean all manner of completed paintings in all sizes. One of the orange glow of autumn, another of a green door. Still one more shows only a corner from behind the others. A woman's basket, covered with her shawl, along with the curve of her arm and the points of her fingers.A large lamp stands directly behind the chair and sometimes heats the cheek of the artist on late nights. Now the bulb is cold. An easel sits opposite the light; it supports 29 x 56 1/2 inches of the sky -- if one looks closely, so the nose almost touches the canvas, the eyes are fooled and the nape of the neck feels the chill of a breeze.
To the side and somewhat behind the easel, a table shrinks away from the window. A piece of paper the color of a faded pink linoleum floor rests here; toward the top, written in a hasty hand, is a list long forgotten: brushes; paint; coffee and sardines; the address of the laundromat. Below the list floats a sailboat sketched with the nub of a pencil, charcoal clouds above. The color of the paper suggests the sun has slipped under the clouds for a moment before the lapping darkness is complete.
The kitchenette; the towel with the bluebirds; glasses in the sink.
A partition to hide the toilet.
Books nestled into the back of the couch.
The Road Menders and its sibling.
On the couch lays the artist. Awake but still. Hands knitted behind head. Crossed legs draped over the arm. But now the legs are drawn in, and in a moment our student sits up; the hands separate, one sent through the hair, the other retrieves a pencil. A sketchbook materializes. Peripheral vision in the left eye can't unsee the two roads hanging there on the wall, and an intimate knowledge circles back and, beginning with the hand drawing a grey bucket, this understanding seeps up the arm and into the mind: tonight will be a night of sounds.
Stillness. A breath and a closing of the eyes. The treetops move as one in the soft wind, and every tree moves in step; the ancient ones moan and shudder. Footsteps on soft ground, some close, others -- in pairs -- echo off the sand piles and weave between the tree trunks. An unseen bird calls for its mate, and then calls again. Wheels turn and complain. Men shout, but their voices trail off and are lost, overtaken by the scratch of digging tools and the tink, tink, tink of a chisel.
Dreams and sounds walk hand in hand up the worn steps of night, and there they will comune in a dance-like whirl until the sun spills upon the feet of the expectant easel.
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