Still life paintings by Vincent van Gogh (Paris)

[1] In spite of his unusual demeanor, disheveled clothes and often time frightening manner, Paris was the one place where Van Gogh developed friendships with other artists.

[7] Seeing and trading artwork with the Parisian avant-garde artists, Van Gogh understood what Theo had been trying to tell him for years about modern art.

[10] Monticelli was a French painter of the generation preceding the Impressionists who was friends with Narcisse Diaz, a member of the Barbizon school, and the two often painted together in the Fontainebleau Forest.

[15] Van Gogh was influenced by Impressionists Edgar Degas and Claude Monet, but even more so by Neo-Impressionist Georges Seurat, partly because of the use of dots of contrasting colors to intensify the image, a technique called Pointillism.

Van Gogh likened painting with constructing small, thoughtfully placed dashes of color to writing "words in a speech or a letter".

The name evokes the technique of cloisonné, where wires (cloisons or "compartments") are soldered to the body of the piece, filled with powdered glass, and then fired.

Post-Impressionists extended Impressionism while rejecting its limitations: they continued using vivid colours, thick application of paint, distinctive brush strokes, and real-life subject matter, but they were more inclined to emphasize geometric forms, to distort form for expressive effect, and to use unnatural or arbitrary colour.

[19] Characteristic features of Ukiyo-e woodprints include their ordinary subject matter, the distinctive cropping of their compositions, bold and assertive outlines, absent or unusual perspective, flat regions of uniform colour, uniform lighting, absence of chiaroscuro, and their emphasis on decorative patterns.

But this blade of grass leads him to draw every plant, and then the seasons, the wide aspects of the countryside, then animals, then the human figure… isn't it almost a true religion which these simple Japanese teach us, who live in nature as though they themselves are flowers.

Two complementary colors of the same degree of vividness and brightness placed next to one another produce an intense reaction, called the "law of simultaneous contrast.

Excited to try out complementary studies, Van Gogh would divide a large canvas into several rectangular sections, trying out "all the colors of the rainbow.

[27] Soon after Van Gogh arrived in Paris, he began painting still lifes with the goal of experimenting with contrasting colors.

[29] Van Gogh courted Agostina Segatori, the owner of the Café du Tambourin on the boulevard de Clichy, for a period of time and gave her paintings of flowers, "which would last for ever".

[30] The energy that Van Gogh put into his Still Life paintings is representative of his habit for "working systematically, concentrating on a theme until he had exhausted it.

"[32] Van Gogh had an agreement with the Agostina Segatori proprietress of Café du Tambourin, an establishment that catered to Montmartre artists, for meals in exchange for a few paintings each week.

Van Gogh was not a purist; he varied the shades of contrasting colors and chose subjects that he enjoyed, such as painting still lifes.

The dashes of lemon, pink, orange and green seem to bring life to the books, like the blossoming flower that[52] also adds a feeling that the paintings is made for a woman.

The books are Naturalist novels: "Braves Gens" by Jean Richepin, "Au Bonheur Des Dames" by Émile Zola and "La Fille Elisa" by Edmond de Goncourt.

He wore the boots on an extended rainy walk to create the effect he wished for this painting, which may have been a tribute to the working man.

On the table sits a glass of absinthe, its green-yellow liquid lighter for window's sunlight and in contrast to the brown background.

Absinthe was popular to Van Gogh and other artists both as a drink, although toxic and in some cases deadly, and because of its unique color, it was also favored as a subject for paintings.

With thoughts of the novel about a prostitute, "La Fille Elisa" by Edmond de Goncourt, Van Gogh gave her the five francs and quickly moved on his way.

[53] In Van Gogh's first months in Paris, he stayed in his brother Theo's small apartment on Rue Laval.

As means of calming himself, Vincent painted fall fruit in the autumn of 1886, which he imbues with seemingly "supernatural vitality and beauty."

"[61] Still Life with Apples, Pears, Lemons and Grapes (F382) was Van Gogh's opportunity to explore Blanc's recommendation about combining colors: "If one brings together sulfur (yellow) and garnet (dark red), which is its exact opposite, being equidistant from nasturtium (orange) and campanula (blue-mauve), the garnet and sulfur will excite one another, because they are each others' complementaries."

In the background, Van Gogh used short brushstrokes of light blue and pink, giving the impression that the fruit is sitting in a basket.

Van Gogh may have seen Claude Monet's Still Life with Apples and Grapes in Paris, but while the subject matter is roughly the same, the composition is not.

"[62] Having removed any form of distraction, such as a table or background,[61] Van Gogh placed each piece of fruit by itself, creating a "semi-abstract, decorative effect.

[65] Van Gogh made Still life with Carafe and Lemons (F340) quickly, with a very thin layer of paint that does not completely obscure the canvas.

[50] Van Gogh's work in still life reflects his emergence as an important practitioner of modern art, particularly integrating techniques of Impressionism.