The bedroom

THE BEDROOMPainted in October 1888;

Oil on canvas,72x90 cm

Here is half of the whole picture. Finish it using a pencil.

Here is the original painting:

Whose bedroom is it?

The bedroom belongs to the artist Vincent

van Gogh. When he painted it, he

was living in Arles, a town in Provence, in the south of France.

Try to describe the bedroom

It’s a very tidy bedroom.

By painting my bedroom where everything is in its place, I am

showing that I have now decided to take care of myself and to organize

my life properly. I haven’t got a house my own.

I am a real bohemian artist.

This is the house!

What do the colors look like, pretty or not?

The weather in Holland, where I was born, is not

always good, so here I am, in Provence, in search of

sunshine. That’s the reason I love having a bedroom so full of light and bursting

colors.

Name all the furniture you can see in the bedroom.

There isn’t much furniture.

I am very poor so I only have the essentials, and what I have is very plain

furniture. Of course there is a bed, and there are also

two chairs, in case someone comes to visit me.

There are paintings on the walls.

I spend all my time painting. It is the thing I love most in the

whole world. For me it is unthinkable to live in a place

without paintings. On the right-hand side there are two

portraits of friends and underneath are drawings,

done on paper. On the back wall there is a landscape.

Why are my belongings in pairs?

There are two chairs, two pillows, two portraits on the wall, two drawings

and even two doors.

I don’t share the bedroom with anyone but maybe multiplying everything by

two makes me feel less lonely.

There is nothing to suggest it is a painter’s bedroom.

There is no way of knowing that it’s an artist´s bedroom because my materials are not on display. We

can not see any colored pencils or paint brushes. I use to work

outside for many hours every day. I want my bedroom for relaxation,

for making myself feel comfortable and for sleeping peacefully.

It’s a very simple picture.

The objects are very normal, and the colors are flat, without any

tones.

I want my pantings to be easy to understand. The outlines of the

colors are easy to follow, because I generally use thick lines.

Do people like my paintings?

When Van Gogh died in 1890, he only sold one painting.

People normally find them frightening, but

very few people actually know my own paintings.

When I finish one panting, I use to send it

to my brother Teo in Paris.

How did van Gogh become so famous?

People only began to appreciate the impact of his work after he died. He was terribly lonely and finally he committed

suicide, still unknown to the world.

Almost fifty years later, people started to see him like a hero, and to appreciate his work. There are also some movies

about him. Our feelings about him today go beyond the pictures he

painted.

Is it true that van Gogh was mad?

Can you see a bandage around his ear?

Do you know what happened?

He was anxious and psychologically fragile, and he suffered a great deal.

During the time that he was alive, doctors didn’t know how to properly

treat mental and emotional problems. But when he painted, he knew exactly what he wanted to do and why, and he was extraordinary

sensitive and intelligent.