At dusk and after nightfall, find a location where artificial light is absent and immerse yourself in the drama of the nocturnal skyscape. This iconic painting is the expression of van Gogh’s language of evocative color and passionate mark-making.
The Museum of Modern Art says: “The whirling forms in the sky […] match published astronomical observations of clouds of dust and gas known as nebulae.
The style he developed in Paris and carried through to the end of his life became known as Post-Impressionism, a term encompassing works made by artists unified by their interest in expressing their emotional and psychological responses to the world through bold colors and expressive, often symbolic images. In a letter to his sister Willemien, touching upon the mind and temperament of artists, van Gogh once wrote that he was ‘very sensitive to color and its particular language, its effects of complementaries, contrasts, harmony.'”
The Starry Night
by Vincent van Gogh
Date: Saint Rémy, June 1889. Medium: Oil on canvas.
View this painting at:
The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY.
Floor 5, in Painting and Sculpture I, Gallery 1.