Flowering Orchards is a series of paintings which Dutch artist Vincent van Gogh executed in Arles, in southern France in the spring of 1888.

Appreciating the symbolism of rebirth, Van Gogh worked with optimism and zeal on about fourteen paintings of flowering trees in the early spring.

In Almond Tree in Blossom, Vincent used the light, broken strokes of impressionism and the dabs of colour of divisionism for a sparkling surface effect.

"The southern region and the flowering trees seems to have awakened Van Gogh from his doldrums into a state of clear direction, hyper-activity and good cheer.

[8] To paint the flowering orchards, Van Gogh contended with the winds which were so strong that he drove pegs into the ground to which he fastened his easel.

Apparently he did not reline, a process of heavy pressure and heat to flatten the surface, because sharp edges of thick impasto remain on the canvas.

Patches of thickly laid-on color, spots of canvas left uncovered, here and there portions that are absolutely unfinished, repetitions, savageries… Working direct on the spot all the time, I try to grasp what is essential in the drawings -- later I fill in the spaces which are bounded by contours — either expressed or not, but in any case felt — with tones which are also simplified, by which I mean that all that is going to be soil will have the same violet-like tone, that the whole sky will have a blue tint, that the green vegetation will be either green-blue or green-yellow, purposefully exaggerating the yellows and blues in this case.

"[14]Continuing on with his paintings of orchards, Van Gogh wrote, "At the moment I am working on some plum trees, yellowish-white, with thousands of black branches.

"[15] Two days later he wrote of the same painting, "This morning I worked on an orchard of plum trees in bloom; all at once a fierce wind sprang up, an effect I had seen nowhere else but here, and returned at intervals.

"[16] Van Gogh chose Blossoming Pear Tree as the center piece of a grouping,[17] However, there is no information linking this painting to any others.

The decorative painting, with the small tree in the foreground, the high vantage point and the lack of depth, is strongly influenced by the art of the Japanese printmakers, which Van Gogh admired enormously.

In decadence in its own country, pigeonholed in collections already impossible to find in Japan itself, Japanese art is taking root again among French Impressionist artists.

[22] This may be the painting that Van Gogh referred to as one with a great deal of stippling that depicts an orchard surrounded by cypress trees.

[24] Van Gogh wrote of Pink Peach Tree in Blossom (Souvenir de Mauve) that he completed in March, "I have been working on a size 20 canvas in the open air in an orchard, lilac ploughland, a reed fence, two pink peach trees against a sky of glorious blue and white.

[26]The presence of the glittery white blossoms and absence of leaves indicate that Van Gogh made this painting shortly after the tree flowered.

"[28] Orchard in Blossom (F406) was painted for Theo for May Day with "a frenzy of impastos of the faintest yellow and lilac on the original white mass.

Apparently he did not reline, a process of heavy pressure and heat to flatten the surface, because sharp edges of thick impasto remain on the painting.

It provides a view across a canal, with poplar trees along its banks, toward the historical center of Arles, with the towers of Saint-Trophime and Notre-Dame-le-major to the left, contrasted by recent building of the casern housing the Zouave Regiment to the right.