Sunflowers 1889

Van Gogh is famous for his paintings of sunflowers. 

When van Gogh went to France, he wanted to look for a good 

artistic community where he could find his own place. 

This is when he began to paint the Sunflower series. When he 

first started painting sunflowers in Paris, France around 1887, 

his sunflowers were clips of flowers rather

than an entire vase of sunflowers, as in his paintings later on. 

He painted these inorder to decorate Paul Gauguin’s home. 

I wanted to concentrate on this painting of a vase

with 15 sunflowers because it shows depth beyond its simplicity. 

He used yellow a lot during this part of his life, a color 

that can give the effect of livelihood.

However, as this painting shows, yellow is used with a brown color that 

suggests an image of death. All of the colors in between yellow 

and brown are used as if suggesting all of the

stages from life to death. Incorporating all the differences in the 

petal structure, the colors of the centers of the flower, and the 

colors of the petals, this simple painting creates

so much balance that the theme of life and death is apparent.