Wheatfield under Thunderclouds

In Auvers, Vincent van Gogh painted a large number of landscapes with wheatfields, all on unusual, elongated canvases (50 x 100 cm). He wrote to his brother Theo about two of these works: “They depict vast, distended wheatfields under angry skies, and I deliberately tried to express sadness and extreme loneliness in them.” But these pictures also had a positive side: “I am almost certain that these canvases illustrate what I cannot express in words, that is, how healthy and reassuring I find the countryside.”