terrible passions in red and green ...

Night Café

"I have tried to express the terrible passions of humanity by means of red and green" van Gogh wrote. Yellow walls give on to blood-red walls that lead to an obtrusive green ceiling, and lining the walls are the locals at the bar tables, hunched over in late-night stupor. Lamps hang from the ceiling, surrounded by Vincent's wheels of curving yellow strokes. A stark black and white clock looms in the background, impossible to miss. It is almost a quarter past midnight in this desolate scene.

"Night Café" painted in Arles in 1888 is, in the artist's own words, "…one of the ugliest I have ever done" ... a collection of clashing colors in the dreariest atmosphere with fully two-thirds of the painting the floor of the café, executed in sulphuric yellow with exaggerated lines of perspective that yank the eye into the painting. A green billiard table, outlined in heavy black, stops us cold. Beside the table stands a figure in a light-colored coat, staring out at us without expression, perhaps the cafe owner for whom allegedly the painting was made to pay off a debt.