Gloria Fossi - In Search of Van Gogh: Capturing the Life of the Artist Through Photographs and Paintings

A frame from Crows, a vignette from the 1990 film Yume (Dreams), by Akira Kurosawa.

Mondadori Portfolio: COLLECTION CHRISTOPHEL Warner Bros.

Today, it would no longer be possible to photograph these places as Mario and Danilo did. (Mario passed away in 2015, and this book is dedicated to him. Danilo is still working; he does not use digital equipment, and he develops his black-and-white photos himself.)

Online itineraries make it easier than ever to visit Van Gogh landmarks, curtailing the charm of discovery. However, the internet and new renovations also offer new opportunities. Although some locations or buildings are no longer open to the public, others have become available for the first time. In Zundert, the house where Vincent was born now hosts an exhibition space and artists in residence. The Saint-Paul de Mausole monastery and former psychiatric hospital allows visitors to enter through the hall depicted in a famous painting and visit the room where Vincent stayed in 1889. Dr. Gachets garden in Auvers-sur-Oise is once again full of trees, plants, and flowers, including the notorious purple foxglovethe subject of a new analysis in this book. His house, which Van Gogh described as full of dark, dark, dark paintings, brightened by a few Czannes and Pissarros, is now a museum. When we got there in 1990, we were met with hostilitywe werent even allowed in. But Danilo wasnt deterred. He climbed onto the roof of our car while I tried to distract the custodian, who was suspicious of us and wouldnt leave the window. (This is why I wanted to keep the picture taken from the car, from outside the boundary wall, even though we could have gotten a much better shot today.) Meanwhile, the Caf de la Paix in Auvers has lost its mystique. When we went there for a drink, we spotted a portrait of Kirk Douglas, looking exactly like Van Gogh, hanging among the pictures of former patrons.

Other places have remained intact: in the Auvers cemetery, ivy still covers Vincents and Theos adjoining tombs, while the Auberge Ravoux is a house-museum. Visitors can climb the stairs to Vincents narrow room, where he spent his last hours wounded and in pain. Old windmills still dot the moors of the Brabant. The port of Antwerp is still bursting with life, just as Van Gogh described it in 1886though with the addition in 2016 of a futuristic building designed by star architect Zaha Hadid shortly before her untimely death. In Paris, where Montmartre is always Montmartre, my beloved Les Fusainsan enchanting and quiet artists retreatis off-limits to the public.

Each of Van Goghs former residences has become a tribute to the artist. The prestigious Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdamnow the Vincent van Gogh Foundationhas expanded and modernized its spaces. When in Auvers, it still feels natural to imagine yourself inside a Van Gogh painting as you walk in silence through a field of grain. Akira Kurosawa did just that, thirty years agoonly a few weeks before we did, though we didnt know it at the time. He literally went inside a Van Gogh painting and reconstructed it in a studio to create a beautiful, pioneering short film (full-immersion 3D renderings are common in moviemaking today).

As I write these words now, I see Van Gogh, his work, and the places he inhabited in a new light compared to thirty years ago. Retracing his steps pushed me to explore new directions. For example, I now believeas do a number of American astrophysiciststhat the Whirlpool Galaxy, or M51, discovered in 1773, was the real inspiration behind his iconic