1. Almond blossom (F 671 / JH 1891 [2890]).
[2890]
2. For Aurier, ‘Les isolés: Vincent van Gogh’, see letter 845, n. 2.
3. Van Gogh said this to Aurier in letter 853.
4. In Saint-Rémy Van Gogh painted a total of five portraits of Madame Ginoux, based on the drawing Gauguin had made in Arles: Madame Ginoux (study for ‘Night café, Arles’) [97], 1888 (Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco). Four versions are now known of Marie Ginoux (‘The Arlésienne’): F 540 / JH 1892 [2891], F 541 / JH 1893 [2892], F 542 / JH 1894 [2893] and F 543 / JH 1895 [2894]. The fifth portrait, intended for Madame Ginoux, is lost (see letter 857, n. 1). We do not know which of the versions is referred to here.
[97] [2891] [2892] [2893] [2894]
5. For ‘something on high’, see letter 288, n. 15.
6. The remark ‘that fellow wept as he started painting’ refers to something Millet recounted about his arrival as a young artist in Paris in January 1837: ‘I was only able to stop weeping by dashing in my face fistfuls of water that I took from a fountain in the street’. (Je ne parvins à arrêter mes pleurs qu’en me jetant au visage des poignées d’eau que je pris à une fontaine de la rue). See Sensier 1881, p. 44.
7. This remark probably refers to something Van Gogh had read in 1885 in Jean Gigoux’s Causeries sur les artistes de mon temps about Delacroix, who drew figures after Raphael every day: ‘It was his way of saying his prayers, in the manner of the old masters, who would kneel before starting a work’ (C’était sa manière de faire sa prière, à l’imitation des vieux maîtres, qui, eux, se mettaient à genoux avant de commencer une oeuvre). Gigoux 1885, p. 70.
The legend of Fra Angelico weeping before painting a crucifix originates in Giorgio Vasari’s Vite (1550) and is elaborated and embroidered upon in every subsequent publication. Cf. Sir Martin Conway, M.P., The Van Eycks and their followers. London 1921, p. 103.
8. The words ‘almost smiling’ were taken from Silvestre’s book Eugène Delacroix. Documents nouveaux. See letter 526, n. 2.
9. This quotation, possibly from Victor Hugo, has not been traced.
10. ‘The success in Brussels’ refers to the praise given Van Gogh’s work at the exhibition of Les Vingt in that city, and the sale of one of the paintings exhibited, which he wrote about in the enclosed letter to his mother (letter 855).
11. ‘La Campine’ (de Kempen) is a region in northern Belgium.
12. Van Gogh derived his knowledge of Millet’s way of life primarily from Sensier, who told of Millet’s humble origins and his life as a peasant among the peasants. See Sensier 1881 and cf. letter 493, n. 6.
13. Vincent had already sent Theo seven studies intended for their mother and Willemien. See letter 824.
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