Blossoming Almond Branch in a Glass

Van Gogh reached Arles in late February 1888, stepping off the train from Paris into a south that was still under snow. There was nothing yet to paint outdoors, so in early March he cut a branch from an almond tree, one of the first things to flower in Provence, and set it in a glass of water on his table. Almond blossom meant the winter was ending. He arranged it plainly, a single sprig against a pale ground, the way he had seen branches float across the Japanese woodcuts he collected in Paris. Two years later he would return to almond blossom on a much larger canvas, painted for his newborn nephew. This small glass came first.