Letters from Provence

One hundred and twenty-one letters from Van Gogh's most creatively intense period — written to his brother Theo, his sister Wil, and fellow artists including Gauguin, Bernard, and Rappard. These are not ordinary correspondence but some of the finest art writing ever produced. Van Gogh describes his paintings as he makes them, explains his color theories, recounts his daily struggles with money, health, loneliness, and the Mistral wind. The letters from Arles and Saint-Rémy are especially remarkable: written in the same white heat as the paintings, they give us the artist's own commentary on works that would become icons. Accompanied by the paintings and sketches Van Gogh included in his correspondence, this collection reveals the extraordinary mind behind the brush — articulate, passionate, philosophically serious, and heartbreakingly aware of his own fragility.