Le parc de l'hôpital, à Saint-Rémy (A Corner of the Asylum and the Garden with a Heavy, Sawed-Off Tree)

From May 1889, van Gogh was staying in the Saint-Remy-de-Provence hospital near Arles after voluntarily committing himself. In July he suffered another epileptic fit while working outdoors. Only towards the end of the month was he able to take up painting again. At the beginning of October of the same year he went outside again to make a few sketches of the surroundings of the hospital. In November 1889 he completed two versions of the gardens of the Saint-Remy hospital. Van Gogh described the painting now in Essen in a letter to Émile Bernard (20 November, 1889): »A view of the garden of the asylum where I am, on the right a gray terrace, a section the house, some rosebushes that have lost their flowers; on the left, the earth of the garden – red ochre – earth burnt by the sun, covered in fallen pine twigs. This edge of the garden is planted with large pines with red ochre trunks and branches, with green foliage saddened by a mixture of black. These tall trees stand out against an evening sky streaked with violet against a yellow background. High up, the yellow turns to pink, turns to green. A wall – red ocher again – blocks the view, and there’s nothing above it but a violet and yellow ochre hill. Now, the first tree is an enormous trunk, but struck by lightening and sawn off. A side branch, thrusts up very high, however, and falls down again in an avalanche of dark green twigs. This dark giant – like a proud man brought low – contrasts, when seen as the character of a living being, with the pale smile of the last rose on the bush, which is fading in front of him. Under the trees, empty stone benches, dark box. The sky is reflected yellow in a puddle after the rain. A ray of sun – the last glimmer – exalts the dark ocher to orange – small dark figures prowl here and there between the trunks. You’ll understand that this combination of red ocher, of green saddened with gray, of black lines that define the outlines, this gives rise a little that feeling of anxiety from which some of my companions in misfortune often suffer and which is called ›seeing red‹. And what’s more, the motif of the great tree struck by lightning, the sickly pink and green smile of the last flower of autumn, confirms this idea.«