Influence of The Hague School
Van Gogh is often associated in people's minds with the Impressionist movement but in fact his artistic roots lay much closer to home in the artists of the Hague School such as Anton Mauve and Jozef Israëls.
In a letter to his brother Theo written mid-June 1884, Vincent remarks
- When I hear you talk about a lot of new names, it’s not always possible for me to understand when I’ve seen absolutely nothing by them. And from what you said about ‘Impressionism’, I’ve grasped that it’s something different from what I thought it was, but it’s still not entirely clear to me what one should understand by it.
- But for my part, I find so tremendously much in Israëls, for instance, that I’m not particularly curious about or eager for something different or newer.
Before Vincent painted The Potato Eaters Israëls has already treated the same subject in his A Peasant Family at the Table and judging from comment in a letter to Theo 11 March 1882 Vincent has seen this (or at least a variation of it) and had been inspired by it to produce his own version of it. Compositionally the two are very similar:in both paintings the composition of the painting is centered by a figure whose back is turned to us.
Read more about this topic: The Potato Eaters
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