UNDER GROWTH
By VINCENT VAN GOGH
"UNDER GROWTH" (19.3"/39.8" inches) oil on canvas, Painted by VINCENT VAN GOGH in 1890 (Auvers).
THIS peaceful painting of the woods, with a man & woman walking through the thick undergrowth, is a great surprise, when seen among the high strung works of his last period. It is unusual not only in the quiet harmony of white, yellow, speckled green & lilac, but also in the predominance of vertical lines.
These are not architectural in feeling since there are no corresponding stressed horizon tals but lyrical, a community of friendly presences, shaped like walking figures, upon a soft yielding ground with scattered touches of yellow and white lowers.
It is as if all the coiling forms had been straightened out, & the crisscross net works unravelled, leaving only a simple succession of vertical lines & a shapeless ground.
Not completely unravelled, however, for there is still a trace of the drama tic perspective of his more impassioned works in the divergent vistas through the woods, proceeding from the central foreground tree, but the pull of the open diagonal path at the left is not countered by similar Aights elsewhere.
On the right, the endless forest asserts itself, expanding in all directions without impulsive accents or paths.
VINCENT VAN GOGH PAINTINGS.