Still Life: Vase with Pink Roses

Van Gogh painted these roses in May 1890, in his last days as a patient at the asylum of Saint-Rémy in southern France. He was finally well enough to leave, packing up for the quiet town of Auvers near Paris, and the mood of that hope is all over the picture, in the fresh spring green and the great burst of blossom. He worked the paint in thick, curling ribbons, so the flowers seem to still be opening. One thing has changed since he set down his brush. The roses were pink when he painted them, but the red he used was fugitive and has faded, so today they read almost white. Van Gogh reached Auvers that month. He died there that July, ten weeks after finishing this.