Nature morte aux pots, au bocal et aux bouteilles

In the autumn of 1884 Van Gogh was living at Nuenen in the parsonage where his father was the minister, and giving painting lessons to a few amateurs over in Eindhoven, among them a tanner and a telegraph clerk. He set up pots and bottles for them to work from and painted the arrangement himself, using the dull glaze and the glass to work out what light does to colour. This canvas comes out of that November. Three years later, in Paris, he turned it round and painted a self-portrait on the back, which is why Kunstmuseum Den Haag carries the two sides of one small canvas under two separate inventory numbers.