Top 10 Amazing Facts about Sunflowers by Vincent Van Gogh

Vincent van Gogh’s Sunflowers painting Photo sourced from Wikimedia

Top 10 Amazing Facts about Sunflowers by Vincent

Sunflowers is the title of two series of still life paintings by the Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh. The first series, executed in Paris in 1887, depicts the flowers lying on the ground, while the second set, made a year later in Arles, shows a bouquet of sunflowers in a vase. In the artist’s mind, both sets were linked by the name of his friend Paul Gauguin, who acquired two of the Paris versions.

About eight months later van Gogh hoped to welcome and impress Gauguin again with Sunflowers, now part of the painted Décoration for the Yellow House that he prepared for the guestroom of his home in Arles, where Gauguin was supposed to stay. After Gauguin’s departure, Van Gogh imagined the two major versions as wings of the Berceuse Triptych, and finally, he included them in his Les XX in Bruxelles exhibit. 

Let’s take a look at some of the most amazing facts facts about this paintings;

1.Van Gogh did not sell a single one of his Sunflowers

a self portrait of Vincent Van Gogh Photo sourced from Wikimedia

Van Gogh did not sell even a single one of his Sunflowers and when he died they all went to Theo. The reason for this is that in his life time he only sold one self portrait. Another reason also is that Gaugin visited him and during the two-month visit which ended disastrously, he two artists had a blowout fight, and van Gogh sliced off his ear, suffered a mental breakdown and ended up in the hospital. Gauguin fled back to Paris.

A couple of weeks later, however, he wrote to van Gogh requesting that painting, “Sunflowers,” praising it as “a perfect page of an essential ‘Vincent’ style.” Van Gogh was reluctant to hand over what he felt might be his most accomplished work, and so he decided to paint another version of the yellow “Sunflowers” to exchange with a work by Gauguin. He completed that one in January 1889, but never sent it.

2.The Sunflowers is not a single painting

Vincent van Gogh’s Sunflowers painting Photo sourced from Wikimedia

The Sunflowers is not a single painting and is comprised of two series of paintings. The first set of four is known as The Paris Sunflowers which were created when Vincent Van Gogh lived with his brother Theo in the City of Light, ahead of moving to Arles in the south of France in 1888. The second set of sunflowers were painted that August, when the artist Van Gogh began the Arles Sunflowers while renting four rooms in a yellow house.

It’s very easy to distinguish the two sets from one another.The Arles Sunflowers are posed in vases, poking skyward; the Paris series presents the flowers lying on the ground.The Arles sunflowers were thought to have been painted for his friend Paul Gauguin who came to live with him in his yellow house in Arles.Van Gogh however later decided to use sunflowers as his artistic signature in later life. 

3.The colors used on the Sunflowers are groundbreaking 

Vincent van Gogh’s Sunflowers painting Photo sourced from Wikimedia

Van Gogh used groundbreaking colors on the Sunflowers which makes the sunflowers among the mist unique paintings in the world. Art critics still marvel at the detail and depth van Gogh drew out of layering shades of yellow.But, as the BBC noted, such colors were new to painters: “These series of paintings were made possible by the innovations in manufactured pigments in the 19th century.

Without the vibrancy of the new colors, such as chrome yellow, van Gogh may never have achieved the intensity of Sunflowers.” Alternately, without an artist like van Gogh, these colors may have never had their potential fulfilled.This colors are crucial in the Sunflowers and bring their uniqueness to its audience.  

4.Paul Gauguin who the Arles set we’re made for was impressed and wanted to keep them

Paul Gauguin Photo sourced from Wikimedia

Paul Gauguin, the French Post-Impressionist painter, was an admired friend and colleague of van Gogh’s. Through letters, the pair planned for Gauguin to visit Arles in October of 1888 so that the two artists might work alongside each other. Ahead of Gauguin’s arrival, van Gogh decided he would decorate the Yellow House with paintings to please his guest. The first wave was of sunflowers.

 Gauguin was impressed with the sunflowers that he declared them “a perfect example of the style that was completely Vincent.” After two months in Arles, Gauguin asked if he could trade one of his pieces for one of van Gogh’s Sunflowers.He really loved the paintings in his room to the extent he wanted to exchange them with his masterpieces. 

5.The Sunflowers are among Van Gogh’s most popular paintings.

Paul Gauguin’s painting of Vincent van Gogh while painting sunflowers Photo sourced from Wikimedia

Sunflowers are among Van Gogh’s most popular paintings and are displayed all over the globe with several Museums across the globe having an exhibition of the Sunflowers. Paintings from the Paris series can be found in Amsterdam’s Van Gogh Museum, New York City’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, Switzerland’s Museum of Fine Arts Bern, and the Netherlands’s Kröller-Müller Museum.

The other Sunflowers , the Arles are also found in different museums with, one of the initial Arles series found in London’s National Gallery, the other in Munich’s Neue Pinakothek. The Repetitions are on display in the Van Gogh Museum, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and Tokyo’s SOMPO Museum of Art. This makes them among Van Gogh’s most famous paintings. 

6.One of the Sunflower paintings became a record-breaker in 1987

One of Van Gogh’s Sunflower became a record breaker when it was bought for a very huge fee. One of the most intriguing facts about Sunflowers by Vincent van Gogh is that this contested painting, which is referred to as “Still Life: Vase With Fifteen Sunflowers,” ended up being sold at a record price at the time $39.9million. On March 30, 1987, a total sum of USD $39,921,750 was paid by a rich Japanese insurance company owner called Yasuo Goto for the Still life: Vase with fifteen Sunflowers.

The man eventually donated this painting to the museum in Tokyo where it’s still housed today which is still a mystery regarding the amount he paid for it but his reason are justified. Shortly after, another of van Gogh’s paintings known as Irises was sold to Alan Bond for USD $53.9 million at Sotheby’s, New York, on November 11, 1987, smashing the recently set record by nearly USD $14 million!

7.Two of the Sunflower paintings have never been sold

Van Gogh who sadly never sold any of sunflowers will be a happy man in his grave for what his paintings turned out to be more so the Sunflowers. The became some of the most expensive paintings and all of the Sunflowers by Vincent van Gogh have been sold, except for two of them. These two include the first study he made of the Paris Sunflowers and the repetition he made of the 4th version of the Arles series.

Both of these paintings are now owned by the “Vincent van Gogh Foundation” which was established in 1962 by his nephew Vincent Willem van Gogh. They are on permanent loan to the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. The paintings have been exhibited at the museum for decades and most people who love art and has visited the museum has been able to view the Sunflowers. 

8.The second version of the Arles series was destroyed in WWII

The Sunflowers which have since become among the most popular paintings, more so the Arles Sunflowers. These series originally consisted of 4 different paintings to its name,however this has now been reduced to only 3 paintings right now. The reason being, the second version was originally part of a private collection in Ashiya, Japan, but was unfortunately destroyed during World War II.

This happened on August 6, 1945, during an air raid conducted by the United States Air Force.The painting had been part of the private collections for years after it was bought by a rich Japanese somewhere along the line. When the Americans hit Japan with an airstrike the sunflower painting and others which were present at a private gallery in the area we’re burnt down. 

9.Van Gogh’s Sunflowers were meant to symbolise gratitude

a self portrait of Vincent Van Gogh Photo sourced from Wikimedia

Vincent Van Gogh who suffered from mental illness over the years wanted to combine two versions of the Sunflowers with Woman Rocking the Cradle, the portrait that he made as an homage to the comforting mother figure. Together, the paintings were to form a triptych. The two Sunflowers were the ‘yellow panels’ that would intensify the colours of the portrait. Vincent thought that the triptych as a whole symbolised gratitude. 

The Sunflowers series has the stamp of Van Gogh on it. Van Gogh, victim to frequent bouts of mental problems, has excelled himself in this series. He has used vibrant colors and they typically express the emotions associated with sunflowers. A bright yellow hue in full bloom, to the shades of brown during wilting and death, all the stages of life and death are woven in a single painting. The Sunflowers paintings are the masterpieces of a genius. 

10.The Sunflowers almost caused a serious fight

The Sunflowers almost caused a serious fight in 1890 which could have led to bloodshed in Brussels when a Belgian painter bristled at having his paintings displayed in the same exhibition as Van Gogh’s Sunflowers and making a comment about the Sunflowers artist Vincent calling him a charlatan.

Vincent’s friend Henri Toulouse-Lautrec who was around heard the disparaging remark anf those words sank into him making him to challenge the Belgian artist to a duel, which though it never took place, could have caused bloodshed.Vincent Van Gogh painted a total of eleven of these canvases, although the most commonly referred to are the seven he painted while in Arles in 1888 – 1889. The other five he had painted previously while in Paris in 1887.