Árvores numa Encosta

Van Gogh painted this in 1887, during the two years he spent in Paris living with his brother Theo. That spring he had met Signac and the younger painters around Seurat, and their method changed how he worked almost overnight. Out on the wooded slopes and parks at the edge of the city, he began breaking his color into small separate strokes and dabs, letting the eye mix them, and trading the dark browns of his Dutch years for lighter greens and blues. He made about 40 of these suburban studies in a single stretch, testing what the new technique could do. Here the dappled light falling between the trunks is built up entirely from those quick, loaded touches of paint.