Quinces Lemons Pears Grapes by Van Gogh Postcard

Quinces, Lemons, Pears and Grapes by Vincent Van Gogh, oil on canvas 1887, is a still life painting of many fruit piled on a rumpled yellow tablecloth. Van Gogh executed the painting during an important phase of his life when he moved to Paris to learn the radical innovations of the Impressionist, Pointillist, Divisionist and Post-Impressionist painters. The brilliant colours of the fruit, rendered in broken brushstrokes of contrasting warm and cool colours, punctuated by pointillist dots of colour, dynamically define the forms, colours and space of the intimate, warm still life. The picture is inscribed at bottom, …mon frère Theo (my brother Theo), a dedication to Vincent’s beloved brother who supported his painting career. Vincent Van Gogh (1853 - 1890) was a Dutch painter of the Post-Impressionist movement known for bold, expressive drawing, swirling brushstrokes and intense, heightened colours. In early adulthood Van Gogh worked as an art dealer, teacher and pastor before taking up the full time study of drawing and painting in his late twenties. Influenced by Rembrandt, the 19th century Realists and Barbizon school, Van Gogh's early paintings featured studies of workers and peasants in sombre earth tones. Moving to France in 1886, Van Gogh met with the startling innovations of the Impressionist painters and began to apply their approach to colour and subject matter, which continued into the mature style for which the artist is most renowned. Van Gogh produced many hundreds of drawings and paintings including portraits, landscapes, still life and flower paintings, and numerous self-portraits that became a dominating influence on the modern art of the 20th century and made him one of the most popular artists of all time.