Cabeça de uma prostituta

Van Gogh painted this in Antwerp in December 1885, a few weeks after leaving the Dutch village where he had spent two years painting peasants. He had come to the port city to become a painter of modern life, and he looked for models among working people. This woman may have worked in a café and, like many poor women then, earned extra money at night. He was not after a likeness so much as a type, and he brushed her face and loose hair in broad, quick strokes. It is one of the last things he made in these dark earth tones. Within two months he left for Paris, moved in with his brother Theo, and saw the bright canvases of the Impressionists for the first time.