The Night in Arles: Van Gogh's Ear and the Yellow House
On the night of December 23, 1888, Vincent van Gogh cut off part of his left ear in Arles, ending his turbulent nine weeks living and working with Paul Gauguin.
On a December night in 1888, in a small yellow house in the south of France, one of the most famous artists who ever lived picked up a razor - and the friendship that had been the great hope of his life ended for good.
Vincent van Gogh had come to Arles that February with a dream: a Studio of the South, a community of painters working side by side. He rented four rooms in a house at 2 Place Lamartine - the Yellow House - and, with money from his brother Theo, persuaded Paul Gauguin to join him. Gauguin arrived on October 23. Vincent painted a run of sunflowers to decorate his guest's bedroom.
The partnership almost didn't happen. Gauguin was broke in Brittany and reluctant to come south; what moved him was money - Theo van Gogh offered him a monthly allowance in exchange for paintings. Vincent, meanwhile, spent August painting those sunflowers specifically for the bedroom his guest would sleep in. Two lonely men, thrown together by a brother's money and a dream of community.
For nine weeks the two men painted, argued, cooked, and drank together. It was one of the most productive stretches of Van Gogh's life - dozens of canvases in weeks. But as Christmas approached, Vincent's mood darkened and the arguments sharpened.
On the evening of December 23, Gauguin said he was leaving. Accounts differ on exactly what happened next - by Gauguin's own telling, Van Gogh rushed at him with an open razor in the street, then stopped and ran back to the house. Later that night, alone, Van Gogh sliced off the lower part of his own left ear, wrapped it up, and carried it to a young woman at a local brothel. She fainted; the police were called.
Van Gogh was hospitalized and released on January 7, 1889. Within days he was painting again - including the famous self-portraits with his bandaged ear, painted from a mirror, which is why the bandage appears on the wrong side. Gauguin left Arles the morning after the incident. The two men never saw each other again.
Why it matters: the ear has become the defining myth of the tortured artist, and it still overshadows the work. But look past the legend and you find the real story of that autumn: two painters, in a yellow house in Provence, pushing each other toward a revolution in color that would outlive them both. Van Gogh sold only one painting in his lifetime; today his Arles paintings are among the most beloved images on earth.
Photo: Vincent van Gogh, public domain (via Wikimedia Commons).
