Van Gogh "Repetitions"

"The Postman Joseph Roulin"
Vincent van Gogh, 1889

"The Postman Joseph Roulin"
VIncent van Gogh, 1889

Vincent van Gogh seems to have been a recurring theme in my thoughts over the past few months. Ipreviously posted about several "breaking news" items concerning Van Gogh, including the exhibit at the Phillips Collection in Washington, DC. Here is link to a review of the exhibit from Fine Art Connoisseur, which I wanted to share with you.

The exhibit is focused on Van Gogh's "Repeitions"--scenes that he painted multiple times, each time with subtle variations. I love the idea of studying these repetitions, and I always wonder what makes us revisit the same subject over and over. Is it a desire to explore the subject more deeply? A wish to make a better painting of it than the time before? The realization that the subject is entirely different in a different season, a different light, or different time of day?

I like to paint in series, and yet I often like my very first painting of the series better than the ones that follow. Perhaps it is something about the freshness of the discovery that makes the first painting sing. The excitement of discovery can be an elusive quality for me to recapture in subsequent paintings of the same subject. That's why I like to vary the composition or point of view.

I appreciated what the review said about this. It noted that the degree of spontaneity helped the curators identify which were the first paintings in the series, and which were the repetitions: "The spontaneity found in the [first] painting pointed to its being the first rendition, while the more controlled execution in the Phillip's street scene designates it as the repetition." I hope to visit the exhibition and see for myself.