Focus on Landscape at Auvers in the Rain and explain the Background.
Vincent van Gogh became an artist at the age of 27, and continued painting until his alleged suicide on 29 July 1890 at the age of 37. Originally based in his home country of the Netherlands, van Gogh spent the last four years of life painting in France, where his greatest artistic innovation occurred. As his mental health declined, allegedly due to an epileptic disorder, van Gogh chose to enter a private asylum in Saint-Remy-de-Provence in the South of France. He spent fifteen months there, continuing to develop a distinct artistic style. Then, he moved to the small village of Auvers-sur-Oise in northern France, where he spent the last three months of his life.Van Gogh lived in Auvers from May to 27 July 1890. In those seventy days, the artist painted over seventy works, enjoying his newfound autonomy after being institutionalised by producing art fanatically. His main correspondences were with his brother Theo van Gogh, to whom he wrote in Paris, and Doctor Paul Gachet, a local homoeopathic practitioner who was interested in Post-Impressionist art and who kept an eye on the artist. Despite his renewed freedom, van Gogh's mental health continued to deteriorate, leading to his suicide. In the last two months of his life, the artist engaged in his "most daring stylistic experiments and freed himself from any remaining academic constraints, which had still hampered his work in the previous months". Notably, he painted twelve double-square canvases of the gardens and fields around Auvers in the last ten days of his life, which displayed some of his most innovative techniques in terms of colour and composition. Landscape at Auvers in the Rain was part of this collection of works, which were probably meant to be a coherent series, and was painted within the last three days before his suicide.
F Saint-Remy-de-Provence Impressionist alleged suicide double-square canvases Paul Gachet Theo van Gogh Auvers-sur-Oise South of France Paris Vincent van Gogh Post-Impressionist