{"id":400132,"date":"2025-09-05T13:56:27","date_gmt":"2025-09-05T13:56:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/400132\/"},"modified":"2025-09-05T13:56:27","modified_gmt":"2025-09-05T13:56:27","slug":"van-goghs-two-pictures-of-the-hospital-in-arles-painted-while-he-was-recovering-after-cutting-his-ear-head-to-the-courtauld-the-art-newspaper","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/400132\/","title":{"rendered":"Van Gogh\u2019s two pictures of the hospital in Arles\u2014painted while he was recovering after cutting his ear\u2014head to the Courtauld – The Art Newspaper"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the months after Van Gogh mutilated his ear, he created just two paintings of the hospital in Arles in which he stayed. By a stroke of good fortune, both were bought in the 1920s by the Swiss collector Oskar Reinhart, though from different dealers. On Reinhart\u2019s death they became part of his museum, which has until recently been prohibited from lending.<\/p>\n

This restriction has now been modified, and the first group of loans are coming to London\u2019s Courtauld Gallery for the exhibition Goya to Impressionism: Masterpieces from the Oskar Reinhart Collection<\/a> (14 February-26 May). The museum in Reinhart\u2019s atmospheric villa<\/a> in Winterthur, just outside Zurich, is temporarily closed for building work and is due to reopen in January 2026. In the meantime, the paintings were available for the Courtauld show.<\/p>\n

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Van Gogh\u2019s Courtyard of the Hospital at Arles and The Ward in the Hospital at Arles on loan to\u00a0to the Courtauld Gallery\u2019s exhibition Goya to Impressionism: Masterpieces from the Oskar Reinhart Collection (14 February-26 May)<\/p>\n

The Art Newspaper<\/p>\n

The pair of Van Goghs, The Courtyard of the Hospital at Arles and The Ward in the Hospital at Arles, will be among the show\u2019s highlights. Both were begun in the second half of April 1889, at a time when the artist was sleeping in the hospital, but allowed to paint during the day.<\/p>\n

This was four months after Van Gogh had mutilated his ear, which had precipitated the abrupt departure of his colleague and lodger Paul Gauguin. His physical wound had healed well, but he was mentally scarred by the trauma.<\/p>\n

Hospital garden<\/p>\n

The Courtyard of the Hospital at Arles<\/a> (April-May 1889) depicts part of the arcaded cloister-like courtyard with its colourful enclosed garden. The male patients were housed on the upper level, on the right in the painting, and Van Gogh must have loved to escape from the noisy and crowded ward to enjoy the springtime. It would have been the best time of the year for flowers.<\/p>\n

I always imagine that the man with a hat seated by the edge of the covered terrace (and apart from the other patients) is Van Gogh himself, perhaps planning this very picture. When he actually painted it, he went to the other side of the courtyard, the south-east corner, so he could include the male terrace and ward. The female patients were in the wing to the left in the picture.<\/p>\n

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Detail of Van Gogh\u2019s The Courtyard of the Hospital at Arles (April-May 1889)<\/p>\n

Oskar Reinhart Collection \u201cAm R\u00f6merholz\u201d, Winterthur<\/p>\n

Vincent gave a detailed description of the painting in a letter to his sister, Wil: \u201cIt\u2019s an arcaded gallery like in Arab buildings, whitewashed. In front of these galleries an ancient garden with a pond in the middle and 8 beds of flowers, forget-me-nots, Christmas roses, anemones, buttercups, wallflowers, daisies etc. And beneath the gallery, orange trees and oleanders. So it\u2019s a painting chock-full of flowers and springtime greenery. However, three black, sad tree trunks cross it like snakes, and in the foreground four large sad, dark box bushes.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Recent photograph of the courtyard garden, reconstructed to look like Van Gogh\u2019s painting
Derek Harris \/ Alamy\u00a0Stock Photo<\/p>\n

The Courtyard of the Hospital at Arles is such a carefully composed and exuberant painting that it is difficult to believe it was made by someone who was suffering as he was. Its composition, with three cropped trees, was inspired by the Japanese prints which Van Gogh so admired. The tree trunks break up the geometry of the flower beds and the two wings of the building. The goldfish in the central pool add a delightful touch.<\/p>\n

Van Gogh also made a drawing of a similar scene, using a thick reed pen. At first glance it may appear to be the same view as the painting, but the drawing shows the courtyard from a different angle, making the trees appear less dominant. Drawn in the first few days of May 1889, it was a farewell work. The artist left on 8 May to voluntarily move to what was then regarded as an asylum just outside Saint-R\u00e9my-de-Provence.<\/p>\n

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Van Gogh\u2019s drawing Garden of the Hospital (May 1889)<\/p>\n

Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (Vincent van Gogh Foundation)<\/p>\n

We can reveal that the painting of the courtyard garden almost became the first Van Gogh to be acquired by London\u2019s National Gallery, even before the Sunflowers<\/a> (August 1888) and Van Gogh\u2019s Chair (December 1888) were bought in the winter of 1923-24.<\/p>\n

However, in 1922 The Courtyard of the Hospital at Arles was offered to what was then known as the National Gallery Millbank (now Tate) for 2,500 guineas (\u00a32,625). This potential acquisition was considered by the gallery\u2019s trustees in November.<\/p>\n

In January 1923 the trustees were informed that the Van Gogh had been \u201csold at a higher price\u201d. The private collector who outmanoeuvred the London gallery was Reinhart, who acquired it via the Paris-based art trade agent Alfred Gold in December 1922. The Reinhart archive suggests that he paid 150,000 francs (\u00a36,000), more than twice what had been considered by the National Gallery.<\/p>\n

It was to be more than a century later that The Courtyard of the Hospital at Arles was lent abroad, to London\u2019s National Gallery. It went to the exhibition Van Gogh: Poets & Lovers<\/a>, which closed on 19 January. When the London curators negotiated the loan, they had no idea that they had almost bought the picture in 1922.<\/p>\n

But if the purchase had gone ahead, then a year later the National Gallery trustees might well have had second thoughts about acquiring the Sunflowers. This turned out to be a bargain: Sunflowers was bought in March 1924 for \u00a31,304, half the price which had been mooted for the courtyard garden picture. By this time Samuel Courtauld had provided a substantial fund to buy Impressionist and Post-Impressionist work for the gallery.<\/p>\n

The Courtyard of the Hospital at Arles was already in London for the National Gallery\u2019s temporary show Van Gogh: Poets & Lovers. It will now be going into the Courtauld exhibition on 14 February. There it will be joined by Reinhart\u2019s other Van Gogh, The Ward in the Hospital at Arles.<\/p>\n

Hospital Ward\"\"<\/p>\n

Van Gogh\u2019s The Ward in the Hospital at Arles (April-October 1889)<\/p>\n

Oskar Reinhart Collection \u201cAm R\u00f6merholz\u201d, Winterthur<\/p>\n

Although Van Gogh described the two paintings as \u201cpendants\u201d (a pair), they could hardly be more different in tone and atmosphere. The Ward in the Hospital at Arles<\/a> shows the men\u2019s ward, where Van Gogh would have slept (or tried to sleep, in what must have been a noisy and uncomfortable environment). The claustrophobic 30-metre long ward is dominated by the double row of curtained beds. At the far end is a prominent crucifix, marking the entrance to the chapel.<\/p>\n

Vincent also described this picture in the same letter to his sister: \u201cA very long ward with the rows of beds with white curtains where a few figures of patients are moving. The walls, the ceiling with the large beams, everything is white in a lilac white or green white. Here and there a window with a pink or bright green curtain. The floor tiled with red bricks. At the far end a door surmounted by a crucifix.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although the composition was largely finished while Van Gogh was at the hospital, six months later he added the stove in the foreground and what he described as “a few grey or black shapes of patients\u201d huddled around it. Vincent admitted to his sister that \u201cit\u2019s annoying to paint figures without models\u201d\u2014and these additions from his memory are not entirely successful.<\/p>\n

Dr F\u00e9lix Rey, who had treated Van Gogh after the ear incident, claimed 40 years later that the group of patients in the picture included \u201ca self-portrait of the painter\u201d. If so, he is presumably the man with a straw hat who is reading a newspaper.<\/p>\n

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Detail of Van Gogh\u2019s The Ward in the Hospital at Arles (April-October 1889)<\/p>\n

Oskar Reinhart Collection \u201cAm R\u00f6merholz\u201d, Winterthur<\/p>\n

The Ward in the Hospital at Arles was bought in 1925 for 250,000 francs (then \u00a310,000), after having been owned by Elizabeth Workman, the British wife of a wealthy shipbroker. The sale shows how quickly prices for Van Goghs were rising in the 1920s. At the time it seems that Reinhart did not realise that he had fortuitously acquired the only two Van Gogh paintings depicting the Arles hospital.<\/p>\n

Hospital to arts centre<\/p>\n

The Arles hospital had been converted from a 1573 orphanage and it continued in operation in its ancient building until 1986, when a modern facility was established on the southern outskirts of the city. Most of the original hospital was then converted into a cultural centre, with a large library established in the shell of the wing where the men\u2019s ward had been located.<\/p>\n

In 1988 I visited the building site and was escorted to the long room which had once served as the men\u2019s ward, with the chapel door at the end (the crucifix had gone). I photographed the darkened space, and this image is the only one of the actual room which has been reproduced in the Van Gogh literature.<\/p>\n

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The former men\u2019s ward in the old hospital in Arles, during demolition and building work (October 1988) and Van Gogh\u2019s The Ward in the Hospital at Arles\u00a0(detail)<\/p>\n

Martin Bailey (photograph) and Oskar Reinhart Collection \u201cAm R\u00f6merholz\u201d, Winterthur<\/p>\n

The space once occupied by the chapel was taken over and converted for the municipal archives. It is there that the few 1888-89 municipal documents concerning Van Gogh\u2019s stay are now housed, including a petition signed by dozens of his neighbours arguing that he was dangerous and should be dispatched to an asylum.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Some years ago, I requested to see the original petition in the archive. It was an eerie experience to read the document just metres away from where Van Gogh\u2019s bed would have stood.<\/p>\n

REVISED:<\/strong> Originally published on 24 January 2024, this blog post was updated with new information on 5 September 2025.<\/p>\n

CORRECTION 27 January: <\/strong>A previous headline for this article stated that Van Gogh\u2019s two pictures of the hospital in Arles had not previously been shown in London. In fact,\u00a0The Courtyard of the Hospital at Arles\u00a0was also part of the National Gallery show\u00a0Van Gogh: Poets & Lovers, which has just closed.<\/p>\n

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Ai Weiwei\u2019s Wheatfield with Crows (2024)<\/p>\n

Lisson Gallery, London<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In the months after Van Gogh mutilated his ear, he created just two paintings of the hospital in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":400133,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7757],"tags":[18095,748,393,4845,4884,257,16,15,18096],"class_list":{"0":"post-400132","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-london","8":"tag-adventures-with-van-gogh","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-exhibitions","12":"tag-great-britain","13":"tag-london","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom","16":"tag-vincent-van-gogh"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115152040347730065","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/400132","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=400132"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/400132\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/400133"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=400132"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=400132"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=400132"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}