Birth of a incomparable draughtsman

   Description:

In 1888 Vincent explored every neighborhood at Arles, France. 

Among these was his favorite haunt, the Abbey of Montmajour.  It basically was a pile of ruins with an eighty-five foot tower built on a limestone plateau rising over the marshy plain.  Montmajour and the Montage de Cordes rise were islands surrounded by the swirling estuaries of the Rhone and the Durance rivers where they met a couple of centuries before the rivers changed directions.

From the rocks of Montmajour Vincent had a experience of nature, not uncommon for this particular artist.  It is moreover the technique of drawing with a cut reed-pen he used in his drawings at this time to create these fantastic pieces of art work.  No new sensation for him which were the techniques used by earlier visionary realist's such as Rembrandt and Hercules Seghers.

Never before had Vincent achieved such purity of expression and one would indeed have to look back to what Rembrandt, Seghers, Ruysdael's and Hokusai had done, but Vincent's skill show quite admirably up agaist their works.

vanrijngo.    http://webexhibits.org/vangogh/letter/18/509.htm?qp=business.selling