1. Theo and Van Rappard had got to know each other in Paris; see letter 160, n. 6.
2. For Van Gogh’s high opinion of Van Rappard, see for example letters 343, 344 and 347.
3. This is the planned drawing of potato lifting; see letter 353.
4. Van Rappard was working on a drawing of a forge in which rollers could probably be seen. Cf. exhib. cat. Amsterdam 1974, p. 82, cat. nos. 94-95.
5. Van Gogh admired the naturalism and realism of the writers named; they did not idealize the hard reality of a factory or workshop.
6. Besides the drawing of diggers on which he is working, Van Gogh means the five large drawings he had done in recent weeks: Peat diggers in the dunes (F 1031 / JH 363 [2437]), a sand quarry (‘workmen labouring’), two versions of the refuse dump and a scene at the coal yard at Rijnspoor station. Except for the first, these drawings are not known.
[2437]
7. Lamp-black, which contains a fine-grained, deep black pigment.
top