The Roulin Family is a group of portrait paintings Vincent van Gogh executed in Arles in 1888 and 1889 of Joseph, his wife Augustine and their three children: Armand, Camille and Marcelle.
The family, with children ranging in age from four months to seventeen years, also gave him the opportunity to produce works of individuals in several different stages of life.
Rather than making photographic-like works, Van Gogh used his imagination, colours and themes artistically and creatively to evoke desired emotions from the audience.
[2] He said of portrait studies, "the only thing in painting that excites me to the depths of my soul, and which makes me feel the infinite more than anything else.
I want to paint men and women with that something of the eternal which the halo used to symbolize, and which we seek to communicate by the actual radiance and vibration of our colouring.
"[4] As much as Van Gogh liked to paint portraits of people, there were few opportunities for him to pay or arrange for models for his work.
The reason for multiple works was partly so that the Roulins could have a painting of each family member, so that with these pictures and others, their bedroom became a virtual "museum of modern art."
[11] Roulin saw van Gogh through the good and the most difficult times, corresponding with his brother, Theo following his rift with Gauguin and being at his side during and following the hospital stay in Arles.
[12] In the very first days of December 1888 Vincent told his brother Theo: I have made portraits of a whole family, that of the postman whose head I had done previously – the man, his wife, the baby, the young boy, and the son of sixteen, all of them real characters and very French, though they look like Russians.
[13]The size given (Toile de 15, c. 65 x 54 cm), the complete set can be identified: Augustine Roulin (née Augustine-Alix Pellicot) was born on 9 October 1851 in Lambesc and died on 5 April 1930.
Van Gogh admired the work of Dutch master Frans Hals whose portraits display lively brushwork and the direct, spontaneous style of alla prima, or wet-on-wet .
Van Gogh made a connection to her earthy nature by the depiction of germinating bulbs, essentially declaring her a "human tuber."
[15] Van Gogh labeled the group of work La Berceuse meaning "our lullaby or the woman rocking the cradle."
[18] The Museum Folkwang work depicts Armand in what are likely his best clothes: an elegant fedora, vivid yellow coat, black waistcoat and tie.
In it, Roulin's asked by his father, Joseph, to deliver a letter to Vincent's brother, Theo van Gogh.
The critically acclaimed film employed oil painters trained to paint like van Gogh.
[21] Camille Roulin, the middle child, was born in Lambesc in southern France, on 10 July 1877, and died on 4 June 1922.
[19] Marcelle Roulin, the youngest child (31 July 1888 – 22 February 1980) was four months old, when Van Gogh made her portraits.
[7] The three works show the same head and shoulders image of Marcelle with her chubby cheeks and arms against a green background.
The vibrant yellow background creates a warm glow around mother and baby, like a very large halo.
The work contains varying brushstrokes, some straight, some turbulent – which allow us to see the movement of energy "like water in a rushing stream."