Haunting Wheat Field With Crows Painting At The Van Gogh Museum In Amsterdam
Vincent Van Gogh's Wheatfield With Crows is, in my unschooled opinion, one of Van Gogh's lesser known pieces. I myself only recently discovered it in the summer of 2009 when I was privileged to spend two days in Amsterdam and visited the Van Gogh Museum. I was familiar with some of Van Gogh's more popular works, not because I know much about art but because they inundate our society. Pause for a moment and think of the Van Gogh works you are familiar with. They include his Sunflowers, Night Cafe, Yellow House, Starry Night and Irises, all of which appear on everything from t-shirts and mugs to calendars.
The Wheatfield with Crows painting apparently does, too, albeit to a lesser degree and I expect that is why I was unfamiliar with it. Coming face-to-face with it in Amsterdam was my introduction and sparked a desire in me to learn a bit more about this slightly eerie, somewhat ominous and definitely thought-provoking masterpiece. This painting was considered to be one of his most powerful paintings. It is also the one which is most strongly debated for it has been considered the artist's suicide note.
INTERPRETATION OF THE PAINTING
Van Gogh painted three 50 by 100 centimeter wheatfields at Auvers. Of two of them he said, "
They depict vast, distended wheatfields under angry skies, and I deliberately tried to express sadness and extreme loneliness in them." and "
I am almost certain that these canvases illustrate what I cannot express in words, that is, how healthy and reassuring I find the countryside."
People interpret Vincent Van Gogh's July 1890 Wheatfield With Crows as representing his troubled state of mind shortly before his death. They take that dark sky, choice of path direction and the crows circling as signs of darkness or death.
THE PATHS:
The paths seen in the painting are sometimes seen to reflect choices. Choices to Van Gogh's past and to the future. They are also interpreted as an indication of the confusion regarding the direction of his life and the middle path has raised the questions of whether or not it leads anywhere or whether it simply leads to the end.
THE SKY:
Van Gogh often depicted the sky as stormy. He was respectful of nature and found storms liberating. Storms, he felt, were an important part of nature.
THE CROWS:
A powerful part of this painting is, of course, the crows. There is a lot of symbolism involved and a lot of debate about whether or not the crows are flying to or away from Van Gogh. That makes a difference as to how you perceive them. Are they a threat or not? The VG Gallery feels that this debate is unimportant. First, they feel that since it is impossible to prove which way the crows are going, it is irrelevant and second, they feel that Van Gogh generally celebrated nature and so would not have found the crows to be a threat.
LAST PAINTING?
This painting is often thought to be Vincent Van Gogh's last painting, although this fact has never been proven.
See you
at the art gallery!
Brenda
Treasures By Brenda
MORE VINCENT VAN GOGH:
Though fictional, this book looks at the art world.
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