Almond Blossom by Vincent van Gogh

Almond Blossom by Vincent van Gogh

Branches against the sky

Branches of an almond tree in blossom cross a clear blue sky, seen from below and close up, with no ground and no horizon. The white flowers, some open and some still in bud, are outlined crisply, and the dark branches bend and fork across the whole canvas. The flat, bright background and the cropped, close-up branch owe a great deal to the Japanese woodblock prints Van Gogh collected and admired. Almond trees are among the first to flower in Provence, often in February, and the blossom stands here for new life.

A present for a nephew

He painted it at Saint-Rémy in February 1890, when he heard that his brother Theo and Theo’s wife, Jo, had had a son and named him Vincent after his uncle. The picture was a present for the new parents, and they hung it in their home in Paris. The child, Vincent Willem van Gogh, grew up to be the guardian of his uncle’s work: the family collection he placed in a foundation became the core of the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, where this painting now hangs.

Where it hangs

It is in the Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam, and measures 73.5 by 92.4 centimetres.

About this print

Made from a 7,149-pixel photograph of the original, enough to print sharply at up to about 47 inches on its longest side.

Sources: Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam · Wikidata Q1432536 · Wikimedia Commons