A flurry of golden-yellow and burnt-orange brushstrokes imbues Gauguin’s 1888 painting Lane at Alyscamps, Arles with a sense of movement and atmosphere. The work suggests the gentle rustle and fall of leaves on a crisp autumn day. The fleeting beauty of the changing seasons frames Gauguin’s view of an ancient cemetery, consecrated for the burial of Christians in the third century by the first bishop of Arles. The passage of time is palpable in the deterioration of the Roman necropolis. Little remains of this grand monument, aside from a few empty sarcophagi and an avenue lined with poplars on the painting’s left side.
Gauguin’s autumnal colour palette enlivens the compacted earth of the avenue itself, appearing all-the-more vibrant in contrast with surrounding shapes of cool green grass and grey-blue stone sarcophagi. Directional brush-marks lead our gaze along the avenue towards the seventeenth-century portal of the disused and unfinished church of Saint-Honorat.
Lane at Alyscamps, Arles encapsulates a short, but rich period of collaboration and creativity when Gauguin and Vincent Van Gogh painted side-by-side, in friendship and in competition, on the plains of the Crau, and at Alyscamps. Having migrated south from Paris in 1888, van Gogh envisaged a community of artists working together at Arles and desperately wanted Gauguin to be involved. Persuaded by his correspondence with Vincent, and with financial support from Theo van Gogh, Gauguin left Pont-Aven in Brittany and arrived in Arles in October 1888.
With much anticipation, van Gogh prepared to receive Gauguin for a six month stay in his newly rented home, known as ‘the Yellow House’, decorating a bedroom for Gauguin with his recent paintings of sunflowers. Van Gogh took Gauguin to his favourite sites and the pair worked at Alyscamps for four days before heavy rains forced them indoors. Gauguin painted two views of the cemetery alongside van Gogh’s four. While van Gogh is renowned for his use of impasto, or thickly applied paint, Gauguin’s inclination towards rusticity is evident in his decision not to disguise the coarseness of the canvas, instead allowing its weave to show through.
The initial excitement and optimism of Gauguin and van Gogh’s collaboration and co-habitation was short-lived. Living in cramped quarters and with no respite from the rain, a drunken argument occurred on 23 December. Van Gogh lunged at Gauguin with a razor, and the latter fled for Paris. The following morning, a remorseful van Gogh turned the blade on himself, cutting off a portion of his left ear. The two artists never saw each other again. Gauguin later claimed to have been unimpressed by the Roman cemetery at Arles and the flat treeless landscape of the Camargue area. Looking at Lane at Alyscamps, Arles this is hard to believe.
