Focus on Houses at Auvers and explore the Description.
The central house was a townhouse in the hamlet of Chaponval, about a mile west of the Auberge Ravoux. It was situated at 5 Rue de Gré (49°4′16.02″N 2°8′48.94″E) and still exists, although renovated. It belonged to a mason named August Lecroix and was the subject of an earlier 1873 painting by Paul Cézanne titled La maison du Père Lacroix. Hulsker thought Houses at Auvers was painted shortly after van Gogh arrived. De La Faille thought it painted a little later at the beginning of June, citing a letter of 10 June 1890.The two thatched cottages at the left are set at right angles. They reappear in F780 Thatched cottages in Auvers (see below).Van Gogh was generally meticulous in his depiction of street scenes, a fact that allowed the precise location of the F766 White House at Night to be ascertained, an Auvers painting that was once thought lost but re-emerged in 1995 in the collection of the Hermitage Museum.Toledo Museum of Art, the holding museum, points to the structural juxtaposition of the blue-tiled roof and the adjacent thatched roof of the house. Vigorous brush strokes, varying in direction, are used to highlight the contrast and textures. By contrast, the trees and garden are represented in the characteristic swirling manner van Gogh developed at Saint-Rémy. Pickvance notes the colour scheme is restrained in accordance with van Gogh's return to the North, but also in response to the weather conditions: the sky is laden with clouds and a poplar tree bends to the force of the wind. The paint is applied remarkably thinly in places, and there are bare patches of canvas. Van Der Veen & Knapp remark that at the time of writing (2010), the shutters still retained their original green colour.
Toledo Museum of Art White House at Night Auberge Ravoux Paul Cézanne Saint-Rémy Hermitage Museum Cézanne see below left