A bed of blue-violet irises blooms in red-brown earth, their leaves twisting like flames, with a single white flower among them. Van Gogh painted it in his first week at the Saint-Rémy asylum and called it “the lightning conductor for my illness”. It was once the most expensive painting in the world.
Key facts
- Artist
- Vincent van Gogh1853–1890 · Dutch
- Date
- May 1889
- Period
- Post-Impressionism1886–1905
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- 74.3 × 94.3 cm
- Location
- The Getty Center Los Angeles, United States
Actual size
Compared with an adult 170 cm tall
Palette
#709187#547277#897C58#616A3E#354B5CBackground
In May 1889 Van Gogh voluntarily entered the asylum of Saint-Paul at Saint-Rémy. He was allowed to paint in its garden, and within his first days he painted this bed of blooming irises.
He saw painting as a way to fight his illness, calling this picture “the lightning conductor for my illness” — concentrating on work kept him sane. That September Theo sent it to the Salon des Indépendants in Paris.
In 1987 it sold at auction in New York for about 53.9 million dollars, then a world record. The buyer could not complete payment, and in 1990 the painting was acquired by the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles.
Technique & composition
There is no sky and no distance, only a close-up of the flower bed, like the cropped views of nature in Japanese prints. are drawn in flowing curves that cross and recross, full of movement.
The flowers are built from dark outlines and flat colour; makes a complementary contrast with the blue-violet blooms, while add a warm note.
Details
Symbolism
The lone white iris
Amid all the blue-violet, stands out. Many see it as a self-portrait of Van Gogh: different, alone apart from the crowd.
The force of life
The twisting, upward-reaching leaves and open blooms are full of the energy of growth. In the asylum Van Gogh found comfort and the will to go on in the plants of the garden.
Stories
- Did you know?
The flowers we see today are blue, but Van Gogh painted them violet. The red pigment he mixed in was fugitive and has faded, turning the violet into blue.
- Did you know?
Van Gogh regarded the picture as a study rather than a finished work. His signature, “Vincent”, can be seen at the lower right.
Legacy
With its strong outlines and flat colour, Irises shows the deep influence of Japanese prints on Van Gogh. Its record price made him a legend of the art market and fuelled the auction boom for Impressionist and Post-Impressionist painting in the 1980s.
