1888, Vincent van Gogh, Oleanders -- Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York)
From the museum label: For Van Gogh, oleanders were joyous, life-affirming flowers that bloomed "inexhaustibly" and were always "putting out strong new shoots." In this painting of August 1888 the flowers fill a majolica jug that the artist used for other still lifes made in Arles. They are symbolically juxtaposed with Émile Zola's La joie de vivre, a novel that Van Gogh had placed in contrast to an open Bible in a Nuenen still life of 1885.
Link to a high-resolution close-up photo of details from this painting.
Link to other van Gogh paintings.
1888, Vincent van Gogh, Oleanders -- Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York)
From the museum label: For Van Gogh, oleanders were joyous, life-affirming flowers that bloomed "inexhaustibly" and were always "putting out strong new shoots." In this painting of August 1888 the flowers fill a majolica jug that the artist used for other still lifes made in Arles. They are symbolically juxtaposed with Émile Zola's La joie de vivre, a novel that Van Gogh had placed in contrast to an open Bible in a Nuenen still life of 1885.
Link to a high-resolution close-up photo of details from this painting.
Link to other van Gogh paintings.