Arles: The Land of Hope Sought by Van Gogh

Arles is about a 40-minute drive from Avignon. Around noon, although the sun was shining brightly, a sudden, pounding rain began to fall. It was so intense that an umbrella would have been useless.

It started raining just before we arrived at the parking lot, so we waited in the car for about 20 minutes while watching people scurrying about. Then the rain stopped, the blue sky opened up, and the strong sun returned.

Arles is a place associated with Vincent van Gogh.

🔸 "Café Terrace at Night"

We headed to the Place du Forum, the center of the city.

This is the café depicted in Van Gogh's "Café Terrace at Night." I had always hoped to visit it if I ever traveled to Arles, but it is currently closed for business.

The original café painted by Van Gogh was destroyed by bombing during World War II, but it was reconstructed as "Café Van Gogh" in the early 2000s.
However, unfortunately, intentional large-scale tax evasion and fraudulent accounting by the café's management were discovered, and it was forced to close for administrative and legal reasons.

The exterior remains as it was, but given the reason for its closure, it is a shame, especially since the surrounding cafés and hotels in the square are very lively.
If they had managed it properly, it would likely have continued to be loved as a site associated with Van Gogh.

Many tourists were taking commemorative photos in front of the closed café.

🔸 "Garden of the Hospital in Arles"

A few minutes' walk from this café is the Espace Van Gogh (formerly the Arles City Hospital).

This is the general hospital where Van Gogh was taken and admitted after the "ear-cutting incident" in December 1888.

When you enter the courtyard, there is a beautifully maintained flower garden. This is the location that served as the model for Van Gogh's masterpiece "Garden of the Hospital in Arles," and the courtyard is faithfully recreated as it was when he painted it.
The former city hospital has been redeveloped into a general cultural center, now housing university and educational facilities, the city archives, and galleries.

Van Gogh thought of creating an atelier in Arles as an ideal utopia for painters and called upon his fellow artists to join him. However, the only one who actually came was Paul Gauguin.
They began living together in the "Yellow House" in Arles, but due to differences in their artistic views and production styles, intense conflicts became constant.
On the night of the ear-cutting incident, they had a heated argument, and Gauguin finally told him he was leaving, saying, "I can't stay with you anymore."
With his dream of a community of artists he admired shattered, Van Gogh was overcome by a deep sense of loneliness and despair.
Also, because his brother Theo, on whom he relied mentally and financially, had become engaged, he felt he had lost his only confidant, which exacerbated his pre-existing mental illness.
The ear-cutting incident is said to be the result of such extreme mental stress and the breakdown of human relationships.

🔸 "The Langlois Bridge at Arles"

To the outskirts of Arles.
About 30 minutes by car from the old town of Arles, along the Arles-Bouc Canal that connects Arles to the port town of Port-de-Bouc, was that very drawbridge. It is called the Langlois Bridge.

In a quiet place where a landscape of water spreads out along a leisurely road lined with poplar trees, there are no signs or explanatory notes (though it appears on Google Maps).
There is no parking lot either. However, since it is a place where there is nothing else in the entire vicinity, you can park freely on the shoulder of the wide road.
In Europe, even on country roads, places where you can stop are strictly designated, and the shoulders are narrow, so it is rare to see a place like this.

The drawbridge was at the end of a small path about 20 meters across the road.

The bridge that exists today is a relocated reconstruction. The original bridge that Van Gogh painted was replaced by a concrete bridge in the 1930s, and that, too, was destroyed during World War II.

The drawbridge seen today is said to be a Dutch-style drawbridge of the same shape and era that was located elsewhere on the same canal, which was dismantled and relocated to the current site to be restored as the "Van Gogh Bridge."

Between March and May 1888, shortly after arriving in Arles, Van Gogh was strongly drawn to this wooden drawbridge that reminded him of his home country, the Netherlands, and he painted 10 works including oil paintings and watercolors, changing the perspective, weather, and colors.

The area around the bridge is beautifully maintained, and you can quietly immerse yourself in the world of the painting.

Just as I finished taking photos of the drawbridge and was about to return to the car, despite my reluctance to leave, the sky turned a dark gray in just two or three minutes, and a wind that hinted at rain began to blow.

When I crossed the road and returned to the car, large drops of rain suddenly began to fall. I started the car, but the rain, now mixed with hail, suddenly intensified and pounded against the car; even with the wipers on max, I couldn't keep up and couldn't see ahead.

In Germany, too, it often happens that a minute after you realize "it's starting to rain," it suddenly turns into a rainstorm. Even though I'm used to it, it surprises me every time.
It would have been terrible if I had been walking outside. The rain when we arrived in Arles around noon was bad, but this was even more intense.

To give you an idea of how intense and heavy the rain was, after it stopped, O looked at the car and said happily,
"The car is cleaner than when we washed it!"
The wide road along the canal continued, and there were plenty of shoulders where we could stop temporarily. It was dangerous, so we decided to park for a while and wait it out. It would have been a disaster if we had been on the highway.

When we parked the car, several other cars began to park in front and behind us as well. About 30 minutes later, it finally started to let up. It was fortunate that this sudden change in weather happened after we had been moved by seeing the drawbridge.
In this region, which is rich in nature, perhaps Van Gogh incorporated not only the bright and beautiful light but also the harshness of nature into his works.

V talked non-stop to O, who was driving, about Van Gogh's life and trivia about the drawbridge.

And I continued to talk about how moved I was, thinking about how much Van Gogh must have been touched to see a Dutch-style drawbridge in the nature of Arles.
"I can't hear the navigation voice, so please be quiet for a bit,"

I was told again by O, who is not very interested in history.

The city of Avignon is almost here.

—End—

🔹 Trip to Provence in Southern France [Highlights of the Day]

❇︎ Various other stories will be published in a separate article after returning to Germany.

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