Sunflowers, Friendship and Gratitude
Van Gogh began painting in late summer 1888 and continued into the following year. One went to decorate his friend Paul Gauguin's bedroom. The paintings show sunflowers in all stages of life, from full bloom to withering. The paintings were considered innovative for their use of the yellow spectrum, partly because newly invented pigments made new colours possible.
In a letter to his brother Theo, Van Gogh wrote:
"It is a kind of painting that rather changes in character, and takes on a richness the longer you look at it. Besides, you know, Gauguin likes them extraordinarily. He said to me among other things - 'That...it's...the flower.' You know that the peony is Jeannin's, the hollyhock belongs to Quost, but the sunflower is somewhat my own."
Read more about this topic: Sunflowers (Van Gogh series)
Famous quotes containing the words friendship and/or gratitude:
“Ties of blood are not always ties of friendship; but friendship founded on merit, on esteem, and on mutual trust, becomes more vital and more tender when strengthened by the ties of blood.”
—Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (1694–1773)
“Alas, how quickly the gratitude owed to the dead flows off, how quick to be proved a deceiver.”
—Sophocles (497–406/5 B.C.)