At Alpha Reproduction, we believe that certain places forever shape the destiny of artists.
For Vincent van Gogh, Auvers-sur-Oise was not just a peaceful village north of Paris: it was the stage of his final creative burst, a refuge of silence where painting became a cry of the soul.
Between May and July 1890, in just 70 days, Van Gogh created about 70 works there — roughly one painting per day — in a feverish, urgent, almost prophetic burst.
Golden fields streaked with crows, a church swaying under a vibrant sky, portraits deep with humanity: this short period is often considered the emotional and stylistic peak of his entire career.
In this blog, we invite you to explore this final chapter, through the eyes of an artist in search of light, inner peace, and the absolute.
🏡 Why did Van Gogh choose Auvers-sur-Oise?
In May 1890, after a long period of isolation at the asylum of Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, Vincent van Gogh feels the need to change his environment, landscape, and balance.
His brother Théo, concerned about his condition but confident in his return to a more peaceful life, advises him a compromise: a place close to Paris, but away from its turmoil. This place is Auvers-sur-Oise, a rural village just 30 kilometers north of the capital.
This choice is not accidental. Auvers already attracts some artists, such as the painter Charles-François Daubigny, and offers Van Gogh an authentic, rustic, preserved setting. Here, no crowds or worldly distractions, but old houses, dirt roads, fields as far as the eye can see, and above all this northern light so dear to the Impressionists.
For Van Gogh, this new beginning represents much more than just a move. He sees the possibility of a renewal, a reconnection to nature, to the essentials, and to his art — in a calm yet inspiring environment.
It is also, in the background, an attempt at healing, at reintegration into a world he has so often perceived as hostile.
🌾 A village transformed into a work of art
Upon his arrival in Auvers-sur-Oise, Van Gogh is struck by the simple poetry of the place. This peaceful village, made up of winding alleys, sloping roofs, and untidy gardens, immediately becomes an inexhaustible source of inspiration.
In this still authentic countryside, every corner becomes a subject, every detail a motif to explore.
The golden wheat fields, the twisted trees, the houses with ochre walls, everything seems to vibrate under his gaze. Van Gogh no longer seeks to faithfully represent the world: he wants to convey the emotion, the inner life, the silent soul.
He does not paint what he sees, but what he feels.
Auvers thus becomes a pictorial theater, a sensitive mirror where the artist projects his latest questions, his hopes, his impulses.
His canvases do not depict a village: they transform it. Through color, rhythm, and the intensity of the brushstroke, Van Gogh elevates the everyday to the status of a masterpiece.
👨⚕️ The decisive meeting with Doctor Gachet
One of the key moments of Van Gogh's stay in Auvers-sur-Oise is undoubtedly his meeting with Doctor Paul Gachet, a doctor unlike any other.
Recommended by Théo, Gachet is a homeopathic doctor, passionate about art, an amateur engraver — and above all, deeply sensitive to the psychological fragility of artists.
From their first exchanges, a form of complicity is created between the painter and the doctor. Gachet becomes both a confidant, a model, and a silent witness to Van Gogh's inner state.
He is the one who will appear in one of the painter's most famous portraits:
👉 The Portrait of Dr. Gachet, created with overwhelming intensity, shows a pensive man, almost weary, his head resting on his hand, surrounded by medicinal plants.
But the relationship does not stop at the portrait. Van Gogh also paints the doctor's lush garden, transforming his plants into colorful, almost living swirls.
Gachet offers the artist a caring gaze, a form of psychological stability — although, unfortunately, this support will not be enough to definitively soothe his troubles.
In this relationship between art and care, Van Gogh nevertheless finds a space for sincere expression, a rare humanity, and a trust that fuels his creative drive.
🎨 The 70 masterpieces of Auvers: a frenzy of creation
À Auvers-sur-Oise, Van Gogh entre dans une période de création fulgurante. En moins de 70 jours, il peint environ 70 tableaux — un rythme quasi surnaturel, qui témoigne de son urgence intérieure, mais aussi de son inspiration inépuisable. Jamais auparavant il n’avait peint autant, aussi vite, avec autant de maîtrise.
These works are not mere sketches or preparatory studies: they are major canvases, now preserved in the world's greatest museums.
They cover all the genres he explored in his career:
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Vibrant landscapes, such as Wheatfield with Crows or Path in the Rain
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Rural buildings, such as Houses at Auvers or The Church at Auvers
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Deep portraits, including the famous Portrait of Dr. Gachet
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Plant natures, like The Garden of Doctor Gachet or The Roots of Trees
Each canvas seems inhabited by a unique intensity. The colors are bolder, the contrasts more daring, the shapes more expressive.
Van Gogh no longer tries to convince: he reveals, without restraint, what he has deep inside him — a mixture of light, pain, and beauty.
This frenzy of painting gives birth to one of the artistic pinnacles of his entire work, a true synthesis of emotion, landscape, and color.
🖌️ A liberated and expressive style
In Auvers-sur-Oise, Van Gogh reaches full artistic maturity.
Freed from the constraints of the asylum and carried by the energy of the place, he lets his gesture speak with a new freedom.
His style, already bold in Arles and Saint-Rémy, becomes here more fluid, more instinctive, almost lyrical.
The lines undulate, the contours dissolve, the colors intensify.
In Wheatfield with Crows, the chopped brushstrokes depict the wind, anxiety, the inner turmoil.
In The Church at Auvers, the perspective deliberately wavers, giving the building a floating, almost unreal appearance.
In Tree Roots, the material itself becomes a language: that of underground life, of invisible complexity.
Van Gogh no longer paints the world as it is, but as he deeply feels it.
His works from this period are silent confessions, pictorial translations of the soul.
He no longer hesitates to accentuate, distort, saturate — not to shock, but to express the tension between reality and emotion.
It is this style, free and inhabited, that will make his canvases from Auvers major milestones of post-impressionism, and works of a power still relevant today.
🖼️ Where to admire Van Gogh's paintings in Auvers today?
The works that Van Gogh created in Auvers-sur-Oise are today among the most precious treasures in the history of art.
Preserved in major international museums or in the hands of private collectors, they continue to fascinate, move, and inspire, far beyond their original context.
🏛️ Van Gogh Museum (Amsterdam)
It is in this must-see museum that several major paintings from this period are found, such as Wheatfield with Crows, The Garden of Doctor Gachet, or Tree Roots.
The whole is presented in a chronological journey that allows you to feel the entire stylistic and emotional evolution of Van Gogh up to his final days.
🏛️ Musée d’Orsay (Paris)
In Paris, the Musée d’Orsay preserves masterpieces from the Auvers period, notably The Church at Auvers-sur-Oise, displayed alongside the greatest Impressionist and Post-Impressionist painters.
This work, through its unique construction and mystical atmosphere, has become emblematic of Van Gogh's free and expressive style at the end of his life.
🏛️ Art Institute of Chicago
This American museum houses several late works by the painter, including rural scenes and turbulent landscapes of the Auvers countryside.
Dynamic compositions, vibrant skies, and restless trees show the fullness of his artistic language.
🖼️ Private collections and temporary exhibitions
Some canvases from this period belong to private collections, rarely accessible to the public.
They reappear, however, during prestigious temporary exhibitions, where they generate ever-increasing interest.
✨ The imprint of Auvers in the history of art
The Auvers-sur-Oise period, although brief, holds an exceptional place in the history of art.
It marks the final stage of Van Gogh's journey, but also a dazzling synthesis of his entire artistic quest.
In these paintings, we find everything that makes the Dutch master's uniqueness:
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the emotional intensity of the portrait,
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the expressive power of the landscape,
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the chromatic boldness that transforms color into the language of the soul.
This is where Van Gogh manages to merge his inner vision with the outside world, in a painting free from any academic constraint, with a heartbreaking sincerity.
These paintings, created in a feverish silence, resonate like a pictorial testament, a farewell both luminous and painful.
Auvers is not only his last place of residence: it is the culmination point of a work marked by passion, solitude, and wonder.
More than a final episode, the Auvers period has become a founding milestone of post-impressionism, and a model for generations of artists who, after Van Gogh, will also seek to paint not the world, but what they feel about it.
🗺️ Van Gogh in Auvers-sur-Oise: a route to follow?
Today, Auvers-sur-Oise is much more than a picturesque village: it is a place of artistic memory, a pilgrimage for all who admire the work and sensitivity of Vincent van Gogh.
Through alleys, fields, and buildings, one can still feel the subtle echo of his passage.
📍 The House of Doctor Gachet
Restored and open to the public, this house bears witness to the unique relationship between the doctor and the painter.
You can discover documents, reproductions, period objects — and above all, an intact atmosphere.
📍 The church of Auvers
Immortalized in one of his most famous paintings, the village church has not changed in appearance.
Seen from the right angle, we find the same tilted silhouette, bathed in soft light: a moment of pure emotion.
📍 The Auvers Cemetery
This is where Vincent and Théo van Gogh rest, side by side, under two simple stones surrounded by ivy.
A place imbued with reverence and poetry, which recalls the unbreakable bond between the two brothers.
📍 The Van Gogh journey
A marked trail allows you to walk in the exact footsteps of the artist, discovering the viewpoints of his paintings, explanatory panels, and anecdotes.
From the Ravoux inn to the surrounding countryside, the landscape remains surprisingly close to what he painted.
To take this journey is not only to visit a village, but to enter the mental and sensitive universe of a genius, where every tree, every shadow, every silence becomes a painting.
🌅 Conclusion: Van Gogh in Auvers-sur-Oise, a farewell in light
Vincent van Gogh's stay in Auvers-sur-Oise represents much more than just an artistic phase.
It is the emotional and stylistic peak of his entire work, the ultimate reflection of his genius, expressed in a final breath of free and sincere creation.
In just a few weeks, the artist was able to capture the essence of a village, the fragile beauty of nature, and the silent depth of the human soul.
His canvases still vibrate today with that urgency to paint, to express, to feel.
Through his open landscapes, his intense colors, his expressive lines, Van Gogh leaves us a legacy of rare humanity — that of a man who, despite his pains, chose to respond to the world with light.
Discovering his works from Auvers is entering a form of spiritual intimacy, into a painting that is genuine, that touches, that uplifts.
📚 FAQ – Everything to know about Van Gogh in Auvers-sur-Oise
🟡 How long did Van Gogh live in Auvers-sur-Oise?
Vincent van Gogh lived in Auvers-sur-Oise for about 70 days, between May 20 and July 29, 1890, the date of his death.
This short stay was nevertheless one of the most intense and prolific of his career.
🟡 How many Van Gogh paintings did he paint in Auvers?
He painted about 70 paintings in 70 days, that is nearly one per day.
This production includes landscapes, portraits, village views, and plant scenes of exceptional richness.
🟡 What is the most iconic canvas of this period?
Wheatfield with Crows is often considered the most emblematic of his period in Auvers — and sometimes, rightly or wrongly, as his last painting.
She embodies both the dramatic power of her style and her tormented inner state.
🟡 Can we visit the places where Van Gogh lived and painted in Auvers?
Yes, the village of Auvers-sur-Oise offers a Van Gogh trail with historical points of interest:
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the house of Doctor Gachet
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the church of Auvers
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the cemetery where he rests
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the Ravoux inn, where he lived and died
The village remains faithful to the atmosphere it has so loved.
🟡 Where can the paintings painted in Auvers be seen today?
The paintings are scattered across major international museums:
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Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam
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Musée d’Orsay in Paris
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Art Institute of Chicago
Other works are kept in private collections or displayed at temporary exhibitions.
🖼️ Treat yourself to a hand-painted reproduction of a Van Gogh masterpiece in Auvers
At Alpha Reproduction, we believe that art should not remain locked away in museums.
That is why we offer you hand-painted oil reproductions on canvas, faithful to the paintings Van Gogh created in Auvers-sur-Oise.
🎨 Wheatfield with Crows, The Church at Auvers, Portrait of Dr. Gachet, Houses at Auvers…
All these masterpieces are available in our collection, with the richness of texture, the intensity of colors, and the vibration of the brushstroke found in the originals.
Each reproduction is:
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Hand painted by an expert artist
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Made with oil on canvas, as in the past
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Customizable in size and framing
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Delivered with a certificate of authenticity
💡 Installing a Van Gogh painting at home is inviting emotion, light, and history into your daily life.
Bring to your interior the vibrant breath of Van Gogh's last great creative surge — and make art come alive in the present.
