Wheat Field with Cypresses

1889

Oil on canvas, 73.2 × 93.4 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Ripe wheat, green shrubs and two dark cypresses sit under a sky of rolling clouds. He ranked it among the strongest canvases of that summer.

Curving strokes of thick impasto carry wind and afternoon heat through wheat, trees and clouds. Brushwork, not outline, sets the rhythm.
It is the first version, painted outdoors on the spot.
To him the cypresses resembled an Egyptian obelisk, a dark accent in a sunny landscape.
In a letter he likened the sky to a piece of Scotch plaid.
The Met bought it in 1993 with a gift from the Annenberg Foundation.

That June he made cypresses the theme of an early Saint-Rémy series. He repeated this view in a drawing, a London studio copy, and a replica for his family.

Impasto: Paint laid on thickly enough to stand up from the surface and keep the marks of the brush.

Image: The Metropolitan Museum of Art Open Access · CC0