A postcard has served to locate the possible spot wherever Vincent van Gogh painted what may have been his ultimate masterpiece, art gurus say.
The most likely area for Tree Roots was found by Wouter van der Veen, the scientific director of the Institut Van Gogh.
He recognised similarities amongst the portray and a postcard courting from 1900 to 1910.
The postcard demonstrates trees on a lender in close proximity to the French village of Auvers-sur-Oise.
The web site is 150m (492ft) from the Auberge Ravoux, the inn in the village, in which Van Gogh stayed for 70 times just before getting his possess lifestyle in 1890.
“The similarities ended up really very clear to me,” mentioned Mr Van der Veen, who experienced the revelation at his residence in Strasbourg, France, during lockdown.
Mr Van der Veen introduced his findings to Amsterdam’s Van Gogh Museum, whose researchers done a comparative research of the painting, postcard and the hillside.
The experts, senior scientists at the museum Louis van Tilborgh and Teio Meedendorp, concluded that it was “highly plausible” that the suitable locale had been discovered.
“In our view, the site determined by Van der Veen is extremely probably to be the correct 1 and it is a outstanding discovery,” Mr Meedendorp stated.
“On closer observation, the overgrowth on the postcard exhibits pretty apparent similarities to the form of the roots on Van Gogh’s portray. That this is his last artwork renders it all the extra extraordinary, and even dramatic.”
Mr Van der Veen visited the web site to validate his principle in May well 2020, once coronavirus restrictions had been lifted in France.
A ceremony was held in Auvers-sur-Oise, a several miles north of Paris, on Tuesday to mark the discovery of the clear spot.
Emilie Gordenker, the general director of the Van Gogh Museum, and Willem van Gogh, the great-grandson of Vincent’s brother Theo, had been in attendance to unveil a commemorative plaque at the web page.
‘The final strokes on a dramatic day’
There has prolonged been discussion around which of Van Gogh’s paintings was his last.
In a letter Theo van Gogh’s brother-in-regulation, Andries Bonger, explained how the artist “had painted a forest scene, comprehensive of solar and life” on “the early morning before his death”.
That letter has been utilised to support the declare that Tree Roots was Van Gogh’s remaining get the job done of artwork.
Based mostly on his postcard theory, Mr Van der Veen believes Van Gogh may perhaps have been performing on the portray just several hours before his death.
Mr Van der Veen mentioned: “The daylight painted by Van Gogh suggests that the past brush strokes were painted toward the stop of the afternoon, which presents much more information about the study course of this spectacular day ending in his suicide.”
On 27 July 1890, the troubled Dutch artist shot himself in the chest in Auvers-sur-Oise. He died from his accidents a handful of days afterwards.
At the time of his death, Tree Roots was not solely completed.
