AUVERS-SUR-OISE, France (AP) – The exact location where Dutch master Vincent van Gogh painted his latest work has been pinpointed after being hidden from view for years among a tangle of roots alongside a country road near Paris. Experts say the discovery sheds new light on the painter’s distraught state of mind the day he is believed to have fatally shot himself.
A Dutch researcher realized that the scene depicted in the troublesome artist’s final work, “Tree Roots”, was visible on a faded postcard showing a man standing next to a bicycle on a back street in the village of Auvers-sur -Oise, 35 kilometers (21 miles) north of Paris. Van Gogh spent the last weeks of his life in the village and completed dozens of paintings there. To help, the card even included the street name.
The discovery of Wouter van der Veen, scientific director of the Van Gogh Institute in France, offers a new vision of the artist in his last hours. It means that art historians can now see that Van Gogh worked on the painting until late afternoon, meaning that he spent much of the day concentrating on the canvas.
“There has been a lot of speculation about his mental state, but one thing that is very clear is that he spent a long time working on this painting all afternoon. We know that from the light falling at work, ”Emilie Gordenker, director of the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, told The Associated Press in a telephone interview on Wednesday. “So, you know, he really was working to the end.”
The painting, which is not considered to have been completed by Van Gogh, is hung in the Amsterdam museum. Gordenker said its composition and execution, a strict focus on gnarled roots on a hillside, have led to it being seen as a “harbinger of abstraction.”
Van Gogh never developed the painting style further.
According to the museum’s version of Van Gogh’s life, after working on “Tree Roots,” the artist entered a nearby wheat field during the day and shot himself in the chest with a gun. He died two days later, on July 29, 1890, at the age of 37. Two American authors questioned the theory in 2011, suggesting that two teens shot the artist.
Van der Veen believes the museum’s version of events and agrees that his new discovery shows that Van Gogh had his wits about him and was methodical in his thinking before pulling the trigger to commit suicide.
“So the final steps were also something he thought about carefully,” he said. “Then it was a lucid decision. It wasn’t an attack of madness. “
The new discovery was made, in part, thanks to the coronavirus pandemic.
While trapped at his home during France’s two-month shutdown, Van der Veen used the extra time to organize his numerous archives and documents in Van Gogh, including digitizing images such as the old Auvers-sur-Oise postcard.
One day in late April, during a phone conversation, he saw the card on his computer screen and suddenly realized he was searching for the location of “Tree Roots”. Next to the man and his bicycle, the roots and trees are clearly visible.
“It was an epiphany,” he said. “A revelation”.
He was unable to visit the site for several weeks, but he had a friend on the visit to the village and also took a virtual road trip using Google’s Street View.
Villagers know the place and main root of the tree well, even giving it the name “the elephant” because of its shape, Van der Veen said.
“He was really hiding with the naked eye and was even a bit disguised as he had taken on another identity,” he added.
The researcher says that while his discovery has given art historians more to reflect on Van Gogh’s last business day, it also gives tourists an additional reason to visit Auvers-sur-Oise. The French village already attracts tens of thousands of visitors each year due to its ties to Van Gogh, who spent his last weeks there and is buried in the village cemetery with his brother, Theo.
“They travel a lot for just one reason, to follow in Vincent van Gogh’s footsteps, and now they can stand in the same place where he painted his latest painting,” said Van der Veen. “And that is a very moving thing for many people. So I am very happy to be able to share that with everyone who loves Van Gogh. “
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Corder reported from The Hague, The Netherlands
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