The Bedroom

This is The Bedroom, painted by Vincent van Gogh. It hangs here at the Art Institute of Chicago, in Gallery 241, and the label reads 1926.417.

One thing to know before you settle in front of it. It draws a crowd, so give yourself a moment to find a clear line of sight. The canvas itself is a modest size, smaller than a door, so let it pull you in close rather than trying to take it in from across the room.

What you are looking at is a small bedroom. A bed, two chairs, a table, some pictures on the wall, a window. That is all. No people, no story, just a room, painted the year Van Gogh was living at a hospital in Saint Remy de Provence.

Start close. Look at the brushwork on the floor and the walls. It is thick, almost restless, laid down in short strokes that do not sit still. Now step back, a full pace or two, and let the whole room resolve. Notice how the walls and floor seem to tilt and rush toward the back of the room, faster than a real room would. Find the window at the far end, and see how it seems to both anchor the space and refuse to let it settle.

Here is what most people get wrong standing in front of it. The picture looks anxious, all that tipping perspective and restless paint, and it is tempting to read it as a portrait of a troubled mind. But Van Gogh himself said he meant the opposite. He wanted this room to be restful, to give the eye and the mind a place to stop. So the tension you see in the brushwork was not meant to unsettle you. It was his idea of calm.

One more thing worth knowing. This is not the only bedroom he painted. He made this same room three times, once the year before this one, and once again as a smaller version, a gift for his mother and sister, painted in the very same weeks as this one here in Chicago.

So stand with it a while. Let your eye follow the floorboards back to the window, then come forward again along the bed. See if you find the same room calming, or restless, or both at once.