The Sower — The Quintessence Of Vincent van Gogh’s Favorite Colors

French wheat fields sometimes did wonders to van Gogh’s health and mental state.

The Sower (1888) by Vincent van Gogh. Oil on canvas, 64.2 cm x 80.3 cm. Source: Wikipedia Commons.

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For the iconic 19th-century Dutch painter — it was blue & yellow. Vincent van Gogh had a special place for these two colors, especially later in his artistic journey. He loved them separately and the contrast that the mix of those two could create. A bright and vivid combination always captivated the viewer’s eye, and in many of van Gogh’s paintings — blue and yellow play the central role.

During his time in France, van Gogh developed a great emotional attachment to the rural scenes around Arles. The golden fields of wheat, burnt by the hot August sun, plowers doing their hard labor to ensure their families enjoy the fruits of a good harvest that will keep them alive during the winter. And of course, this process started with a sower, who laid the foundations for the upcoming harvest.

This particular painting of the Dutch artist was inspired by the work of French painter Jean-Francois Millet, who painted a sower in the field in 1865. However, his work was way more industrial, and there were no bright colors to be found. It was purely an image of a hard-working man in a dusty, dirty field with a plower doing his work in the background.

Van Gogh has his own view on the same process that Millet depicted 20 years earlier. Southern France was a perfect location to display the farmer’s labor, adding vivid colors. Van Gogh was able to add his beloved yellow color to basically every painting he created. He believed that yellow is a color that you cannot go wrong with.

For van Gogh, yellow was the color of love and life itself. His works featured a variety of yellow tones — golden, lemon, ochre, and many others. He always wanted to depict the sun the way he saw it, as a huge and sizzling hot ball that could not be bothered by anything.

In The Sower, van Gogh put the sun on display and used a lot of yellow, also adding his favorite blue. The painting consists of these two colors — only the variety of tones separate all the simple yet meaningful details of this artwork. Van Gogh’s perception of this time of year and the labor the sower does — is completely different from what other artists would have presented. It is a vibrant and lively painting, you can almost feel the warmth of the sun that shines bright behind the back of the sower.

Another version of Vincent van Gogh’s sower — a more gloomy one, made in late 1888. Oil on canvas, 32.5 cm x 40.3 cm. Source: Van Gogh Museum

This painting stands out among all the works that van Gogh made in 1888 on the sowing theme. His other works were less vibrant and the figure of the sower seemed more gloomy and less emotional. In this painting, you can feel the start of a new cycle for the French farmer — the beginning of new life. And there is some confidence in the face and stance of the sower. He doesn’t just quietly plants the seed around the field, he looks encouraged and marches towards the end of this important process of every farmer’s yearly cycle.

The Sower never made any breaking news with its high price at the auction houses, but it represents an important period in the life of the Dutch painter. His life ended in a tragic way, but the French rural landscapes at least gave him some glimmer of hope that his mental health might get better one day. These vibrant paintings carried some of the positive emotions van Gogh felt, enjoying the rural landscapes of Southern France.

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