Did Van Gogh’s Yellow House turn blue after his death? – The Art Newspaper

Van Gogh was struck by the color of the modest constructing that he rented in Arles, calling it the Yellow Home. Sadly, it was bombed throughout the Second World Conflict after which completely demolished. However proof has now emerged that, within the late Nineteen Thirties, its exterior was truly painted blue.

When Vincent rented the Yellow Home on 1 Might 1888, he despatched a little bit sketch and wrote to his brother Theo: “At the moment I rented the right-hand wing of this constructing… it’s painted yellow outdoors, whitewashed inside.”

Set in Place Lamartine, close to the railway station, the constructing had two wings. The left facet was occupied by a grocery store (it has a pink awning in Van Gogh’s portray). The correct facet (with the inexperienced home windows) was Van Gogh’s, with two small bedrooms upstairs, his studio was behind the entrance door and the kitchen was on the rear.

The facade was painted yellow when Van Gogh took it on, nevertheless it will need to have been light as a result of he quickly had it repainted – in yellow, in fact. Though the artist was all the time in need of cash, he didn’t wield the paintbrush himself, however acquired another person to do it.

From then on Van Gogh lovingly known as it “my little yellow home”. Yellow was his favorite color – and this will likely even have helped swing his determination to lease that home. (Yellow is the topic of an exhibition which has simply opened at Amsterdam’s Van Gogh Museum.)

Initially Van Gogh simply used the Yellow Home as his studio after which from September 1888 he additionally slept there. In October Paul Gauguin got here to remain, till the horrible night of 23 December when Van Gogh mutilated his ear.

Yellow turns to Blue

The grocery store and Van Gogh’s former residence had been become a café-bar and tobacco store within the Twenties, the Civette Arlésienne. With solely black-and-white pre-Second World Conflict pictures out there, it has all the time been assumed that the constructing’s exterior remained a yellowish hue. However two comparatively unknown work, dropped at our consideration by the Kyiv-based Ukrainian artist Yuri Pikul, counsel a slightly completely different story.

The Swiss artist Willy Guggenheim (1900-77) visited Arles in August 1938 – and depicted the home with a blue facade. Distantly associated to the Guggenheim museum household, he most popular to not be related to them professionally and due to this fact labored below the identify Varlin. Astonishingly, there’s a surviving {photograph} of Varlin at work outdoors the Yellow Home (he’s proven portray a second image, which was purchased by Zurich metropolis council for its places of work).

The next yr the home was depicted by the Romanian artist George Tomaziu (1915-90), who confirmed the outside as a pale blue.

As two unbiased artists depicted the constructing as blue, this will need to have mirrored its precise color within the late Nineteen Thirties, slightly than creative licence. Each artists, who made pilgrimages to Arles, would even have identified that Van Gogh had known as it the Yellow Home.

Destruction

On 25 June 1944 American bombers launched an assault on Arles. Place Lamartine, situated near the strategically necessary station and rail bridge throughout the Rhône, was devastated. The previous grocery store was fully destroyed and the Yellow Home was severely broken.

Van Gogh’s bed room was obliterated, though Gauguin’s bed room (on the appropriate facet) partly survived. The partitions of the studio and kitchen suffered much less injury, however the ceiling collapsed.

The Yellow Home might have been rebuilt, nevertheless it was merely demolished. Even the plaque commemorating Van Gogh’s keep, put in on the facade in 1922, was misplaced and by no means recovered.

Had the Yellow Home survived, it might have turn out to be amongst France’s most-visited vacationer websites outdoors Paris – and would have reworked the financial system of Arles.

Different Van Gogh information

The J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles has a brand new brand, publicised with a element from what have to be their hottest portray: Van Gogh’s Irises (Might 1889).

Martin Bailey is a number one Van Gogh specialist and particular correspondent for The Artwork Newspaper. He has curated exhibitions on the Barbican Artwork Gallery, Compton Verney/Nationwide Gallery of Scotland and Tate Britain.

Martin has written a variety of bestselling books on Van Gogh’s years in France: The Sunflowers Are Mine: The Story of Van Gogh’s Masterpiece (Frances Lincoln 2013, UK and US), Studio of the South: Van Gogh in Provence (Frances Lincoln 2016, UK and US), Starry Evening: Van Gogh on the Asylum (White Lion Publishing 2018, UK and US) and Van Gogh’s Finale: Auvers and the Artist’s Rise to Fame (Frances Lincoln 2021, UK and US). The Sunflowers are Mine (2024, UK and US) and Van Gogh’s Finale (2024, UK and US) are additionally now out there in a extra compact paperback format.

His different latest books embrace Residing with Vincent van Gogh: The Houses & Landscapes that formed the Artist (White Lion Publishing 2019, UK and US), which offers an outline of the artist’s life. The Illustrated Provence Letters of Van Gogh has been reissued (Batsford 2021, UK and US). My Good friend Van Gogh/Emile Bernard offers the primary English translation of Bernard’s writings on Van Gogh (David Zwirner Books 2023, UKand US).

To contact Martin Bailey, please electronic mail vangogh@theartnewspaper.com

Please notice that he doesn’t undertake authentications.

Discover all of Martin’s adventures with Van Gogh right here