Arles...The Roman Empire and Van Gogh

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Day 10
Arles……………Really the only thing I knew about Arles was that Vincent Van Gogh painted there for about a year. He was very productive during his short time here. While I’m not an expert on post impressionism art for which Van Gogh is noted, I do like most of the artists of the Impressionism era. I always thought Van Gogh's paint strokes looked angry and could practically picture him slamming each stroke onto the canvas. Maybe painting was something he felt he had to do and not something he loved to do. Now take Renoir, his easy brush strokes immediately makes me happy, I can imagine being at the gathering in Montmartre dancing the night away in Paris’s fabulous La Belle Epoch period, I start swaying just looking at a Renoir. I feel the same about Manet, Monet and many of their peers whose paintings bring joy to me just looking at them.

I believe Van Gogh was a tortured soul. When he moved to Arles he invited all his artist peers to come down and join him but they did not come, only Paul Gauguin came and they drank a lot of absinthe (our guide told us that most likely Van Gogh was addicted to absinthe) and got into a terrible fight which led to Vincent cutting off a piece of his ear and sending it to some poor prostitute in Arles, he also suffered several Psychotic episodes while in Arles ending up hospitalized at the request of his neighbors so I can understand why his strokes seem angry to me.

While we were in Paris the Van Gogh exhibit was so crowded that I could barely see his Starry Night original except from the side. I did view his self-portrait with his very stern look. He seems so mad and stiff even in his own painting, it is nicely done but evokes anger and sadness just the same.

Our guided walking tour through Arles was amazing. It is 20 miles from the Mediterranean Sea and where the Romans began their trek up the Rhone. There’s a Colosseum here, not as big as in Rome but exactly the same building. It is actually better preserved than the Colosseum in Rome. We went in and sat where the Romans sat and heard about the scheduled events. Apparently there were three “shows” a day. In the mornings they would bring in the condemned prisons and find interesting ways for them to meet their doom. Next would be the Gladiator events. The Gladiators were all slaves that were also actors hoping to put on a great show so they would live to fight again. Finally the evening event was the highest regarded event, the chariots races. We also walked past where Van Gogh’s house once stood and we walked through the hospital where he recovered from the famous ear incident and other unfortunate events that seemed to plague him.

France’s history remains too complicated for me to completely digest but we were told that after the Romans left the Colosseum was gutted out and an entire city was built within its walls to prevent invaders from overrunning their town, the walls of the Colosseum served as protection for the town built inside. Then hundreds of years later the French wanted to preserve the Roman history and restored the building to its original form and content. There were Roman ruins riddled throughout this small town. A Roman column, arched window skeletons, or partial limestone blocks from buildings long gone can be seen scattered everywhere.

World War II took a terrible toll on this town and Vincent Van Gogh’s house was destroyed as was the famous Café from his painting “Café Terrace at Night” however one Café owner whose building is an exact replica of the original (but in a different location) capitalized on Vincent’s now famous painting. He painted his building yellow and named it “Café Noir.” They even have a plaque with the painting on it outside placed there by the city. Very pretty to photograph but our guide suggested we find somewhere else to eat because the food there wasn’t good. Catherine and I went to the Vincent Van Gogh museum exhibit to view some of his original works because we felt cheated at Musee d’Orsay and I must say I began to have an appreciation for his style of painting. The museum was pretty quiet and I was able to really take in his work. His work “haystacks” is really pretty and I had the opportunity to just stare at it for a while.

Once we left and began to meander back to the center of town I was reminded of a feeling I had once walking through the Roman Forum in Italy. As I walked there I was taken in at the fact that I was walking exactly where Cleopatra walked, on the same dirt she walked (or maybe was carried.) I started to feel the cobblestones beneath my feet here in Arles and thought to myself, wow, Vincent Van Gogh walked here in this exact place where I’m stepping, probably drunk on absinthe but my feet walked along with his just the same. He probably had his easel in hand, he walked to a pretty spot set up his paints and began a piece with heavy strokes that is worth millions of dollars today.

Sometimes because these towns remain almost exactly as they were during notable periods of history it is so easy for me to feel the years slip away and really feel what life was like in this town whether it was the Romans or Van Gogh hundreds of years later, you can still feel it.

Vincent Van Gogh died in 1890 in the village of Auvers-sur-Oise in northern France of an apparent suicide. (gun shot wound to his stomach) His final words in life were "la tristesse durera toujours" which translates to "the sadness will never end. "I still think Van Gogh’s paintings are made with very angry and also sad strokes but at least now when I look at his works I am reminded of where he lived, walked and the difficult life he must have led. After leaving here at least I feel I had the opportunity to know and understand him a little better.

Tomorrow the boat returns to Avignon marking the end of our journey on the riverboat but not the end of our travels in France this year. We will board a train and head to the beautiful blue coast in the South of France. I can’t wait to show Catherine and Terry our little slice of heaven in Villefranche, I’m sure she’ll want to move there.

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