Vincent van Gogh and Paul Gauguin lived and painted together in the Yellow House in Arles, a town in southern France, for about nine weeks in 1888, from October 23 to the night of December 23.
It was failing well before that night. The two men quarreled, and Gauguin had already decided to leave when Van Gogh cut off his own ear. Gauguin left Arles within days, and the two painters never shared a house again.
Cool Stories About Art is a newsletter to learn art the fun way.
Join 200,000+ readers and get:
10 new art stories / month
The entire archive of content (140+ articles)
Comment, ask questions, and chat with other readers
The meeting was Van Gogh's idea. In Arles he rented a small yellow house on the Place Lamartine, and he dreamed of turning it into the home of a community of painters.
For months he begged Gauguin to join him. Gauguin, five years his elder, was then working in Pont-Aven, a village in Brittany, in northwestern France, where painters gathered. Vincent's brother Theo, who sold pictures for a Paris art firm, Gauguin's among them, sweetened the offer with 150 francs a month.
What the night of the ear changed was how the ending would be told. The only long account of those last days was written by Gauguin, years later, when Van Gogh could no longer answer, and it most likely bends the facts in his favor.
Nine weeks under one roof
Within weeks of his arrival, Gauguin sat down to write to Theo, the brother who paid him, about the Yellow House and the man he shared it with. That letter has survived, and Van Gogh soon guessed what was in it.
What You'll Discover
Where Van Gogh took his ear.
Where the razor story comes from.
How much of the ear was lost.
Who stayed away from the hospital.