[music]
Steven Zucker: We're at the Getty Center
Steven Zucker: looking at one of the most
Steven Zucker: recognized canvases by Vincent
Steven Zucker: van Gogh. This is "Irises." It
Steven Zucker: was painted in 1889.
Scott Allan: Soon after, he voluntarily
Scott Allan: checked himself into an asylum
Scott Allan: at Saint-Rémy in Provence in
Scott Allan: France not far from Arles where
Scott Allan: he had been staying. He had a
Scott Allan: mental health crisis. There was
Scott Allan: the famous episode of the
Scott Allan: cutting of the ear when Gauguin
Scott Allan: was temporarily living with him.
Scott Allan: That turned out very badly for
Scott Allan: both. After Gauguin left, he
Scott Allan: was hospitalized in Arles, and
Scott Allan: eventually, he checked himself
Scott Allan: in at Saint-Rémy. In the initial
Scott Allan: weeks, my understanding is that
Scott Allan: he was in some kind of medical
Scott Allan: watch. He was not leaving the
Scott Allan: grounds, but he had access to
Scott Allan: the slightly wild overgrown
Scott Allan: walled garden inside the asylum.
Scott Allan: That's where he found his first
Scott Allan: subjects to paint as he began
Scott Allan: this recovery process. Something
Scott Allan: about working very intently from
Scott Allan: the natural beauty that he found
Scott Allan: in this site was very important
Scott Allan: to his recovery.
Steven: I know that he had been
Steven: concerned that he wouldn't
Steven: retain the ability to paint even
Steven: while he was there. In fact, the
Steven: asylum granted him a second room,
Steven: one that he could use as a
Steven: studio.
Scott: Despite these difficult personal
Scott: circumstances, it ended up being
Scott: an incredibly productive and
Scott: fertile time for him as an
Scott: artist. Something about the
Scott: close study of nature, that's
Scott: where he had his grounding as an
Scott: artist. He wasn't interested in
Scott: too much imaginative invention.
Scott: He needed to work from the model.
Scott: He brought a lot of subjective
Scott: intensity to that, which I think
Scott: you can feel here in the intense
Scott: colors, and surging rhythms of
Scott: the blade-like leaves of the
Scott: irises, and these brilliant
Scott: contrasting colors.
Steven: The word that comes to my mind
Steven: is almost the architecture of
Steven: those blossoms. The way in which
Steven: each one is completely
Steven: individual, and there are
Steven: volumes and spaces and
Steven: lines that are completely unique
Steven: to each flower. We are so close
Steven: to these flowers that I get a
Steven: sense of where the artist was
Steven: situating himself in
Steven: relationship to them. The space
Steven: is complicated, it's compressed,
Steven: but I feel like I only need to
Steven: reach my fingers out a few
Steven: inches to touch the petals. He's
Steven: gotten down low so that the
Steven: flowers almost stand as if they
Steven: were human presences.
Scott: The viewpoint is very
Scott: interesting to think about. You
Scott: think of him sitting or kneeling
Scott: right down in, and it's
Scott: interesting to think about how
Scott: you categorize a work like this.
Scott: It's not exactly a landscape. It
Scott: doesn't have the extent and the
Scott: space and the view that one
Scott: associates with landscape, and
Scott: it's not exactly a still life
Scott: either. When you think about the
Scott: word still life, or the French
Scott: version of that word, nature
Scott: morte, dead nature, you think of
Scott: a bouquet arranged in a vaz.
Scott: That's exactly what he's not
Scott: doing here. These are flowers
Scott: that are still rooted in the
Scott: earth, and that are intensely
Scott: alive. It's decidedly not a
Scott: picture of dead nature or still
Scott: life. It's this picture of
Scott: moving life attached to the
Scott: earth. He himself referred to
Scott: the picture simply as a study é
Scott: tude, which in French has very
Scott: specific connotations in
Scott: artistic studio speak of
Scott: something that's done directly
Scott: after nature. That's basically
Scott: what a study is. The idea of a
Scott: study after nature is about the
Scott: best way we can describe a
Scott: picture like this. There's a
Scott: long European tradition,
Scott: especially in Northern European
Scott: countries, for very intense
Scott: close-up studies of nature. If
Scott: you think about Albrecht Dürer
Scott: and his famous, "Patch of Turf,"
Scott: this is the post-impressionist
Scott: equivalent of that.
Steven: In Dürer, there's almost a sense
Steven: of the botanical study. Here,
Steven: there's a vitality and energy
Steven: that feels more wild and more
Steven: emphatic.
Scott: It's that graphic genius of his
Scott: art combined with the lessons of
Scott: color that he learned in a very
Scott: short period of time in Paris
Scott: where he absorbed the lessons of
Scott: both impressionism and neo-
Scott: impressionism, Pointillism, in a
Scott: space of two years, completely
Scott: transformed his art, and then
Scott: goes to Provence and starts
Scott: painting things like this.
Steven: He's coming out of French
Steven: impressionism, but his work is
Steven: definitely not about light and
Steven: color and atmospheric effects
Steven: here. He's interested in the
Steven: specific natural forms.
Scott: The French avant-garde are
Scott: concerned with this idea of
Scott: complementary contrast where you
Scott: take two colors on opposite ends
Scott: of the color wheel. You put them
Scott: together, and they mutually
Scott: enhance each other. You put red
Scott: and green together, that
Scott: intensifies both colors
Scott: simultaneously.
Steven: For that matter, purples or
Steven: violets and yellow. We see both
Steven: of those combinations here.
Scott: You have all these red tones in
Scott: the earth juxtaposed with the
Scott: wonderful greens of the iris
Scott: blades. There are a few moments
Scott: where he's got a more intense
Scott: stroke of red sliding right up
Scott: to the leaf. Then, you have the
Scott: wonderful blue-violet of the
Scott: petals of the irises in
Scott: conversation with yellows and
Scott: oranges. Varying his brushwork
Scott: in ways that brings them out and
Scott: attends to them, you have these
Scott: smooth brush strokes in the
Scott: blades carefully outlined. Then,
Scott: these wonderful directional
Scott: strokes in the petals of the
Scott: irises where he creates the
Scott: sense of volume in the curvings
Scott: in and out.
Steven: It is almost as if the artist is
Steven: here inventing a new genre, a
Steven: new type of painting. This
Steven: wonderful vacuum between still
Steven: life and landscape and botanical
Steven: study, but the artist is also
Steven: drawing on art from Japan.
Scott: Starting in the 1860s, the craze
Scott: for Japanese art starts mounting.
Scott: By the 1880s, it was a major
Scott: point of artistic reference for
Scott: Western European avant-garde.
Scott: Van Gogh was a dedicated
Scott: collector of Japanese prints,
Scott: and the motif of irises is
Scott: central to a lot of Japanese art.
Scott: These are specifically provostal
Scott: irises, but the way he's
Scott: arranged them in this amazing
Scott: asymmetrical freeze in this
Scott: compressed space, that very
Scott: daring cropping of the flowers
Scott: by the bottom framing edge,
Scott: these are lessons that he's
Scott: learning from Japanese prints.
Steven: It's so important to reference
Steven: Van Gogh's study of the art of
Steven: Japan, his study of the art of
Steven: the North, and his study of
Steven: modernism in Paris. It
Steven: undermines some of the mythology
Steven: that surrounds this artist, that
Steven: he was simply painting through
Steven: his sensibility.
Scott: For a relatively compressed
Scott: period of time, the last less
Scott: than 10 years of his life, his
Scott: art grew by leaps and bounds.
Scott: He assimilated so much, and he
Scott: sought out those different
Scott: cultural points of reference.
Scott: Whether it's what was the latest
Scott: in the avant-garde in Paris,
Scott: what was most interesting about
Scott: Japanese art, and then also
Scott: these Northern artistic
Scott: traditions that he had inherited.
Scott: A picture like this amazingly
Scott: synthesizes all of these things.
Scott: Injecting that close-up study
Scott: with nature with such a strong
Scott: degree of personality, he's
Scott: enhancing the vitality of the
Scott: flowers through all these
Scott: stylistic elements. That's how
Scott: we also feel, his subjectivity
Scott: as an artist, through all of
Scott: those same things. It's this
Scott: interesting intensification of
Scott: the objective and the subjective.
Scott: Where you draw the line between
Scott: the two is complicated in this,
Scott: but it's very much grounded and
Scott: rooted in the confrontation of
Scott: the artist with nature. [music]