Roses

On the eve of his departure from the asylum in Saint-Remy in May 1890, Van Gogh painted an exceptional group of four still lifes, to which both the Museum's?Roses?and?Irises?(58.18) belong. These bouquets and their counterparts-an upright composition of irises (Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam) and a horizontal composition of roses (National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.) were conceived as a series or ensemble, on a par with the earlier Sunflower decoration he made in Arles. Traces of pink along the tabletop and rose petals in the present painting, which have faded over time, offer a faint reminder of the formerly more vivid canvas of pink roses against a yellow-green background in a green vase.