NARRATOR:
In a letter to his brother Theo, Van Gogh announced the imminent arrival of this portrait at Theo’s Paris gallery:
VAN GOGH (ACTOR):
“You will shortly be making the acquaintance of Monsieur Patience Escalier, a kind of ‘man with a hoe,’ a former cowherd from the Camargue, and now a gardener at a house in Crau.”
NARRATOR:
The gnarled old peasant possesses a great dignity that vividly expresses van Gogh’s ideas about portraiture.
VAN GOGH (ACTOR):
“Portraiture with the thought, the soul of the model in it, that is what I think should come.”
NARRATOR:
Van Gogh created this powerful image in August 1888, while he was in Arles, in the south of France. There, he found simple, spiritually pure people and a clarity of light that were lacking in Paris.
VAN GOGH (ACTOR):
“The south makes poverty less harsh and melancholy. I painted the impression of the sunnyness, of being burned, scorched by the hot sun and open air.”
NARRATOR:
He wrote about a similar portrait:
VAN GOGH (ACTOR):
“Behind the head, instead of the shabby lodgings, I paint infinity, a simple background of the richest, the most intense blue I can contrive.”
NARRATOR:
Unlike the Impressionists who used color to translate atmospheric effects, van Gogh used his palette to convey an emotional impact. He repeated the yellows in Monsieur Escalier’s hat in sections of his face. And the turquoise of his jacket is echoed in his eyes, cheek, lower lip, and facial hair.
Van Gogh had begun painting peasants about three earlier, in his native Netherlands. He viewed painting the poor as a spiritual activity, and consciously chose to live as an impoverished painter, among peasants. His description of this portrait as a “man with a hoe” refers to the title of a painting by Jean Millet. Like this older contemporary, van Gogh was drawn to these subjects for their honesty, humility and spiritual resonance.
Portrait of a Peasant (Patience Escalier)
August 1888
Vincent van Gogh (Dutch, 1853-1890)
On View
Sunburnt and weather-beaten, the Provençal peasant Patience Escalier gazes out of Van Gogh’s picture with blazing intensity. Dazzling yellow, vivid blue, green, and red make this portrait, painted in August 1888, perhaps the artist’s most daring coloristic experiment to date. “[I]nstead of trying to reproduce exactly what I have before my eyes,” he wrote to his brother, Theo, “I use color more arbitrarily, in order to express myself with force.” He called the picture “a sort of ‘man with a hoe,’” referring to a celebrated work by the previous generation’s great painter of peasants, Jean-François Millet: Man with a Hoe, today in the J. Paul Getty Museum.
Details
- Artist Name: Vincent van Gogh (Dutch, 1853-1890)
- Title: Portrait of a Peasant (Patience Escalier)
- Date: August 1888
- Medium: Oil on canvas
- Dimensions: 25-1/4 x 21-1/2 in. (64.1 x 54.6 cm)
- Credit Line: Norton Simon Art Foundation
- Accession Number: M.1975.06.P
- Copyright: © Norton Simon Art Foundation
Object Information
Mrs. Johanna van Gogh-Bonger, Amsterdam, sold Dec. 1899 to;
Henricus Petrus Bremmer (1871-1956), The Hague, still in 1935, to;
Mr. and Mrs. Edouard L. Jonas, Paris and New York;
Mrs. H. Harris Jonas (Mrs. Edouard Jonas, 1884–1974), New York, to;
[Wildenstein and Co., New York, sold 1975 to];
Norton Simon Art Foundation.
Henricus Petrus Bremmer (1871-1956), The Hague, still in 1935, to;
Mr. and Mrs. Edouard L. Jonas, Paris and New York;
Mrs. H. Harris Jonas (Mrs. Edouard Jonas, 1884–1974), New York, to;
[Wildenstein and Co., New York, sold 1975 to];
Norton Simon Art Foundation.
[on loan]
- The Hague, Gemeentemuseum, 1924 to 1935
Brettell, Richard R. and Stephen F. Eisenman, Nineteenth-Century Art in the Norton Simon Museum, volume 1,
Havelaar, Moderne Kunstwerken, p. 16
Stephan Wolohojian et al., Nineteenth-Century Masterpieces from the Grenville L. Winthrop Collection, Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, fig. 96 p. 145
Lecaldano, Paolo, L'opera pittorica completa di van Gogh e i suoi nessi grafici, no. 543 pp. 210-211
van der Wolk, J., De Schetsboeken van Vincent van Gogh, pp. 276-277
Naifeh, Stephen and Gregory Smith, Van Gogh: The Life,
Art News, p. 6
Eisenman, Stephen F.; with contributions by Crow, Thomas et al., Nineteenth Century Art: A Critical History, fig. 0.5 pp. 17, 334
Vincent van Gogh: Painter, Printmaker, Collector, fig. 55a pp. 142, 146
Dorn, R., Studien zur Kunstgeschichte, no. F433 pp. 352-356
Sjraar van Heugten, Van Gogh in Provence: Modernizing Tradition, fig. 61 pp. 99 - 100
Scherjon, W. and J. de Gruyter, Vincent van Gogh's Great Period: Arles, St. Rémy and Auvers-sur-Oise, no. 62 (illustrated incorrectly printed under caption no. 61) pp. 90-91, 94
Sund, Judy, Van Gogh, fig. 135 pp. 210-211
Arnold, Matthias, Vincent van Gogh: Werk und Wirkung, fig. 66 pp. 144-145, 864
Sund, J., True to Temperament: Van Gogh and French Naturalist Literature, pl. 4 pp. 5-6, 11, 181-185
Campbell, Sara, Collector Without Walls: Norton Simon and His Hunt for the Best, cat. 1130 p. 375
Faille, J. B. de la, Vincent van Gogh, no. 478 p. 342
Van Gogh Museum, Vincent's Choice - The Musée imaginaire of Van Gogh, fig. 83 pp. 88, 98, 274
Hulsker, Jan, Van Gogh en zijn weg, no. 1548 p. 355
Van Gogh Face to Face: The Portraits, fig. 193 pp. 8, 130, 152, 212, 218, 230
Emily Beeny, Stéphane Guégan, Pas de deux: An Exchange of Masterpieces, pp. 2, 20, 55
Masterpieces from the Norton Simon Museum, p. 167
The Complete Letters of Vincent van Gogh, nos. 519, 520, 522, 528, 529, 534
Museums Los Angeles, p. 38
Rudine, W., Follies, p. 2
Shackelford, G., Vincent van Gogh: The Painter and the Portrait, fig. 37 pp. 43, 45, 47
Steadman, David W., The Connoisseur, pl. B p. 223
Faille, J. B. de la, The Works of Vincent van Gogh: His Paintings and Drawings, F.443 pp. 204, 628
Feilchenfeldt, Walter, Vincent van Gogh & Paul Cassirer, Berlin: The Reception of van Gogh in Germany from 1901-1914, no. F 443 p. 95
Hulsker, Jan, The Complete van Gogh: Paintings, Drawings, Sketches, no. 1548 p. 355
Jirat-Wasiutynski, Vojtech, Antimodernism and Artistic Experience: Policing the Boundaries of Modernity, fig. 11.2 177-191
Faille, J. B. de la, L'Oeuvre de Vincent van Gogh, catalogue raisonné, vol. I, no. 443; vol. II, pl. CXVIII, no. 443
Marlowe, J., San Francisco, pp. 120-121
Havelaar, Moderne Kunstwerken, p. 16
Stephan Wolohojian et al., Nineteenth-Century Masterpieces from the Grenville L. Winthrop Collection, Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, fig. 96 p. 145
Lecaldano, Paolo, L'opera pittorica completa di van Gogh e i suoi nessi grafici, no. 543 pp. 210-211
van der Wolk, J., De Schetsboeken van Vincent van Gogh, pp. 276-277
Naifeh, Stephen and Gregory Smith, Van Gogh: The Life,
Art News, p. 6
Eisenman, Stephen F.; with contributions by Crow, Thomas et al., Nineteenth Century Art: A Critical History, fig. 0.5 pp. 17, 334
Vincent van Gogh: Painter, Printmaker, Collector, fig. 55a pp. 142, 146
Dorn, R., Studien zur Kunstgeschichte, no. F433 pp. 352-356
Sjraar van Heugten, Van Gogh in Provence: Modernizing Tradition, fig. 61 pp. 99 - 100
Scherjon, W. and J. de Gruyter, Vincent van Gogh's Great Period: Arles, St. Rémy and Auvers-sur-Oise, no. 62 (illustrated incorrectly printed under caption no. 61) pp. 90-91, 94
Sund, Judy, Van Gogh, fig. 135 pp. 210-211
Arnold, Matthias, Vincent van Gogh: Werk und Wirkung, fig. 66 pp. 144-145, 864
Sund, J., True to Temperament: Van Gogh and French Naturalist Literature, pl. 4 pp. 5-6, 11, 181-185
Campbell, Sara, Collector Without Walls: Norton Simon and His Hunt for the Best, cat. 1130 p. 375
Faille, J. B. de la, Vincent van Gogh, no. 478 p. 342
Van Gogh Museum, Vincent's Choice - The Musée imaginaire of Van Gogh, fig. 83 pp. 88, 98, 274
Hulsker, Jan, Van Gogh en zijn weg, no. 1548 p. 355
Van Gogh Face to Face: The Portraits, fig. 193 pp. 8, 130, 152, 212, 218, 230
Emily Beeny, Stéphane Guégan, Pas de deux: An Exchange of Masterpieces, pp. 2, 20, 55
Masterpieces from the Norton Simon Museum, p. 167
The Complete Letters of Vincent van Gogh, nos. 519, 520, 522, 528, 529, 534
Museums Los Angeles, p. 38
Rudine, W., Follies, p. 2
Shackelford, G., Vincent van Gogh: The Painter and the Portrait, fig. 37 pp. 43, 45, 47
Steadman, David W., The Connoisseur, pl. B p. 223
Faille, J. B. de la, The Works of Vincent van Gogh: His Paintings and Drawings, F.443 pp. 204, 628
Feilchenfeldt, Walter, Vincent van Gogh & Paul Cassirer, Berlin: The Reception of van Gogh in Germany from 1901-1914, no. F 443 p. 95
Hulsker, Jan, The Complete van Gogh: Paintings, Drawings, Sketches, no. 1548 p. 355
Jirat-Wasiutynski, Vojtech, Antimodernism and Artistic Experience: Policing the Boundaries of Modernity, fig. 11.2 177-191
Faille, J. B. de la, L'Oeuvre de Vincent van Gogh, catalogue raisonné, vol. I, no. 443; vol. II, pl. CXVIII, no. 443
Marlowe, J., San Francisco, pp. 120-121
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