Thre
Birds figures, van Gogh has also emphasized their rootedness in the ber 1885
that affords them a livelihood. It almost looks as if the gro
on panel,
dropping away at their feet and they were falling into the
a grave. Judged by the rulebook, these paintings are lit
dilettantish; yet van Gogh, in his own subtle way nas made
of necessit), allowing his own rudimentary manner to be ind
Rom, on loan from in the primaeval rituals of this work. This cle of the asons s
undation
tuted the only paintings that van Gogh did not place at his brute
Three Birds disposal. In February 1884 Vincent had agreed to repay Theos pod
mber October money orders wih paintings. So now his works were regularly being
sent to Paris; indeed, cverything van Gogh produced from this time
a3s x sos cm forth, till the day he died, went to Theo. Vincent considered his
er the owner of his paintings, while The
neo, for
his
as a trustee -though both of them sensibly refrained from dweling
upon the exact details of ownership. The arrangement itself w
they both observed to the letter, without discussing it at any lengthin
their correspondence) was the result of profound differences bet
the two brothers. Vincent had lost s/ght of the alter ego he had alwa
assumed Theo to be. He blamed his brother for his own alienat
from thei parental home, and saw him as the personification of cha
code of respectability that constantly brought home his own inad
Rtar e bin. The break peaked in a sup ib panes in Le
in which Vincent discussed Delacroix's famous painting of the 180
inger Jar revolution, Liberty on the Barricades (in the Louvre in Paris. showing
Uberty leading the people onward. Vincent imagined hinself in the
days of revolutionary fighting in 1830 or 1848, and went on to pi
ture himse\f meeting his brother on the other side: " If we had both
remained true to ourselves, we mi
swate collection found ourselves enemies, confronting each other, at a barricade like
of
that for instance, you as a government soldier and II
bel. Now, in 1884(by coincidence the numbers are the same /o che
other way round
barricades, It s true, but our minds cannot agree."
front each other one
PAIN'TING
