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Lot Essay
Van Gogh painted The Iron Mill in The Hague at a crucial juncture in his early development as an artist. Previously he had made numerous chalk and ink drawings, washed drawings, and largely monochromatic watercolours. He was still only comfortable in working within a limited range of tonal values, and had little understanding of how to use the expressive possibilities of colour. He was indeed a late starter; he was almost thirty years old and had not yet tried his hand at oil painting, the real test of a young artist's progress and skills. Nevertheless, during the early months of 1882 that he spent in The Hague, he made tremendous strides in his draughtsmanship, and acquired a useful understanding of perspective. He put these means to use in a series of carefuly composed and executed watercolours, including the present work, that he painted in the late spring and early summer. He rendered these watercolours more opaquely than previously, and heightened them with bodycolour. In August, less than a month after he painted The Iron Mill, van Gogh made his first oil paintings.
During this period van Gogh was involved in a significant emotional relationship, whose demands shaped his outlook on living and art. In March he wrote to his brother Theo that he had engaged members of a poor family to pose for him - Maria Hoornik, a woman that van Gogh noted was about forty-five, her daughter Clasina Maria Hoornik (called 'Sien'), who was around thirty, and her younger sister, ten or eleven years old, named Maria. Sien was a prostitute and unwed mother of a five-year old daughter, also named Maria. She was expecting another child in July. Van Gogh, who had already drawn her earlier, was attracted to her, partly out of his evangelical compassion for her background and her present needy condition. "I took that woman on as a model and have worked with her all winter. I couldn't pay her a model's full daily wages, but I paid her rent all the same and this far thank God I have been able to save her and her child from hunger and cold by sharing my bread with her" (Letter T192). They began living together in van Gogh's small apartment at 138 Schenkweg (actually on a side-street at this address), on the outskirts of The Hague, some time before May. The artist then revealed their relationship to his brother. Theo admonished Vincent for this improper liason, and had good reason to worry that Vincent might marry Sien out of charity. He nevertheless continued to send money that enabled the artist to pay rent on his living quarters, and keep him supplied with drawing materials and watercolours. This unwavering support came during a critical crisis of confidence for the artist. Van Gogh had recently had a falling out with the painter Anton Mauve, with whom he had been studying, which had been his chief reason for coming to The Hague. Moreover, he was now responsible for supporting his adopted family, an obligation he had freely elected but for which he had no previous experience, with another mouth to feed soon to arrive.
Then there was a matter of personal health. In early June van Gogh wrote to Theo that he was in the hospital, having suffered from sleeplessness, a low fever and difficulty in urinating. He was diagnosed with venereal disease, "what they call the 'clap', but only a mild case" (Letter T206). He remained in the hospital for most of the reminder of June, unable to work, but he took advantage of this opportunity to get much-needed rest, and he began to read the naturalist novels of Emile Zola. Sien, meanwhile, had retired to Leiden to have her baby, which she delivered on 2 July. Just out of the Hospital, van Gogh had found new living quaters in the building next door at 136 Schenkweg, a large attic apartment at low rent, which would allow ample room for Sien and her newborn son, as well as space for a studio. "...For a painter the location is perfect. The view from the attic window is fascinating" (Letter T209).
During the spring of 1882, prior to his hospital stay, van Gogh had been concentrating on landscapes with figures, in addition to figure drawings for which Sien and members of her family had served as models. The principal motivation for the landscapes was a commission from the artist's uncle, Cornelis Marinus van Gogh, an art dealer in The Hague. On 11 March, having seen some of van Gogh's recent city drawings (Hulsker, nos. 111 & 112), C.M. van Gogh ordered a dozen more, for which he offered to pay his nephew one rijksdaalder (2.50 guldens) apiece. Before 24 March the artist completed the first group of the drawings he hoped his 'Uncle Cor' would buy (H., nos. 111-119, 121 & 125). He completed three more by the end of the month (H., nos. 122-124). One wonders at how 'Uncle Cor', whom one might presume had very traditional tastes, responded to Gas Tanks (H., no. 118), the most modern of the subjects that van Gogh depicted in his The Hague townscapes. Lacking any picturesque qualities, it is nonetheless a strong and confidently executed drawing, rendered in convincing perspective with a varied touch, and combining many details within a broadly expansive view. These are the very same qualities that van Gogh would bring to his mature landscape drawings at the end of the decade. In any case, 'Uncle Cor' commissioned further drawings, which van Gogh continued to work on into May. He began to heighten these drawings with white bodycolour. Among them were several backyard scenes, such as the well-known Carpenter's Yard and Laundry (H., no. 150; Rijkmuseum Kröller-Müller, Otterloo), that show extraordinary attention to the most prosaic details of daily living in The Hague's working-class neighbourhoods, even if, as van Gogh claimed in a letter to Theo, "I can see such drawings only as studies in perspective, and I therefore make them chiefly as a means of getting practice" (Letter T200).
In July, following his hospital stay and the move to the larger attic apartment, van Gogh travelled to Scheveningen, where in heightened watercolour he painted the bleaching grounds near the beach, and a fish-drying barn (H., nos. 158 and 160). Back at home on 21 July he painted the "fascinating view" from his attic window in Rooftops (H., no. 156). He was making remarkable progress, for he hoped to have ready a number of accomplished watercolours with which to impress Theo, who was planning to visit him in August. Van Gogh wrote to his brother, "Those I have done now are simply to show you that my studying drawing, correct perspective and proportions, helps me make progress in watercolours .... They are landscapes with complicated perspective, very difficult to draw, but for that reason there is a real Dutch character and sentiment in them ... The drawing is no less conscientious; but in addition these have colour - the soft green of the meadow contrasting with the red tile roof, the light in the sky contrasting more strongly with the somber tones of the foreground...." (Letter T219).
Van Gogh painted The Iron Mill about a week later, around 26 July. As de la Faille has noted (op. cit.), the scene shows the factory of Enghoven on the Zeike, a narrow canal on the outskirts of the city. In a letter sent to Theo during this time, van Gogh wrote, "When you come, I know a few beautiful paths through the meadows where it is so quiet and restful that I am sure you will like it. There I discovered old and new labourers' cottages and other houses that are characteristic, with little gardens by the water's edge, very cosy. I will go and draw there early tomorrow morning. It is a road that runs through the meadows of the Schenkweg to Enghoven's factory on the Zieke" (Letter T220). It is telling that van Gogh passed up the 'cosy' scene for a view of the unquestionably drab Enghoven factory. By now it is clear that while the artist might enjoy conventionally picturesque elements in the landscape, he had little interest in painting them. Instead he preferred the liveliness and complexity of the man-made landscape, the canals along which his countrymen conducted their commerce, and the buildings in which they produced their goods and made their livelihood. Van Gogh's inclination in this direction had been earlier influenced by the detailed realism of English illustrators, and, more recently, the paintings of urban street life by George Hendrik Breitner, a younger artist whom van Gogh had befriended in The Hague. Moreover, following his hospital stay, he immersed himself in the naturalism of the novelist Zola, who treated themes drawn from modern life, which he described in acutely observed detail.
Van Gogh had, during his lay evangelical ministry in 1878-1879, passionately sought to ameliorate the lives of the working poor who bore the brunt of the debilitating effects of the industrial revolution. Here he appears to accept industrialisation as a fact of modern life. Even if the iron factory belches forth smoke, it seems a far cry from 'the satanic mills' decried by the English poet William Blake, and van Gogh indeed seems fascinated by the effect. These pictures pre-figure the work of the politically-motivated French Neo-Impressionists, who were likewise drawn to the novelty of industrial and urban subjects. The urbanised landscape was, for van Gogh, foremost a visual feast, filled with abundantly varied shapes to render, and innumerable details to set down on paper. While his scenes are filled with visual information, they are, in their matter-of-factness, strangely serene, and only rarely project a sense of disturbance or disharmony. On occasion, van Gogh might editorialise, as in his attention to the cross-like dead tree in Pollard Willow, painted on 27 July (H., no. 164). More typically, however, the artist loved the sense of space in the flat, featureless Dutch landscape, and he perhaps used these distances as a way of creating an expansive and harmonious view of the world, in which there was room for man and nature, town and meadow to exist side by side.
Van Gogh's compassionate interest in the world around him was surely his means of offsetting a proclivity towards loneliness and isolation, feelings that were exacerbated by his idealism and lack of pragmatism. In this regard, his acceptance and embrace in his art of the world in its totality, be it factory or hayfield, mirrors his embrace of Sien, a woman in extremely compromised circumstances, with whom the artist found it increasingly difficult to live (van Gogh broke off their relationship when he left The Hague in September 1883). But it seems clear from this relationship, and the pictures that van Gogh painted during this period when he was 'setting out', that he was filling himself with experience in whatever way he could grasp, and in doing so, he sealed his commitment to art as his true life's work. He made his first oil paintings in mid-August, only a few weeks after painting The Iron Mill, following Theo's visit. He wrote to his brother, "I must tell that painting does not seem so strange to me as you would perhaps suppose; on the contrary, I like it very much, as it is a very strong means of expression. And at the same time I can express tender things with it too.... I am very glad I have the necessary materials, for already I had often supressed the desire to paint. It opens a much broader horizon" (Letter T224).
During this period van Gogh was involved in a significant emotional relationship, whose demands shaped his outlook on living and art. In March he wrote to his brother Theo that he had engaged members of a poor family to pose for him - Maria Hoornik, a woman that van Gogh noted was about forty-five, her daughter Clasina Maria Hoornik (called 'Sien'), who was around thirty, and her younger sister, ten or eleven years old, named Maria. Sien was a prostitute and unwed mother of a five-year old daughter, also named Maria. She was expecting another child in July. Van Gogh, who had already drawn her earlier, was attracted to her, partly out of his evangelical compassion for her background and her present needy condition. "I took that woman on as a model and have worked with her all winter. I couldn't pay her a model's full daily wages, but I paid her rent all the same and this far thank God I have been able to save her and her child from hunger and cold by sharing my bread with her" (Letter T192). They began living together in van Gogh's small apartment at 138 Schenkweg (actually on a side-street at this address), on the outskirts of The Hague, some time before May. The artist then revealed their relationship to his brother. Theo admonished Vincent for this improper liason, and had good reason to worry that Vincent might marry Sien out of charity. He nevertheless continued to send money that enabled the artist to pay rent on his living quarters, and keep him supplied with drawing materials and watercolours. This unwavering support came during a critical crisis of confidence for the artist. Van Gogh had recently had a falling out with the painter Anton Mauve, with whom he had been studying, which had been his chief reason for coming to The Hague. Moreover, he was now responsible for supporting his adopted family, an obligation he had freely elected but for which he had no previous experience, with another mouth to feed soon to arrive.
Then there was a matter of personal health. In early June van Gogh wrote to Theo that he was in the hospital, having suffered from sleeplessness, a low fever and difficulty in urinating. He was diagnosed with venereal disease, "what they call the 'clap', but only a mild case" (Letter T206). He remained in the hospital for most of the reminder of June, unable to work, but he took advantage of this opportunity to get much-needed rest, and he began to read the naturalist novels of Emile Zola. Sien, meanwhile, had retired to Leiden to have her baby, which she delivered on 2 July. Just out of the Hospital, van Gogh had found new living quaters in the building next door at 136 Schenkweg, a large attic apartment at low rent, which would allow ample room for Sien and her newborn son, as well as space for a studio. "...For a painter the location is perfect. The view from the attic window is fascinating" (Letter T209).
During the spring of 1882, prior to his hospital stay, van Gogh had been concentrating on landscapes with figures, in addition to figure drawings for which Sien and members of her family had served as models. The principal motivation for the landscapes was a commission from the artist's uncle, Cornelis Marinus van Gogh, an art dealer in The Hague. On 11 March, having seen some of van Gogh's recent city drawings (Hulsker, nos. 111 & 112), C.M. van Gogh ordered a dozen more, for which he offered to pay his nephew one rijksdaalder (2.50 guldens) apiece. Before 24 March the artist completed the first group of the drawings he hoped his 'Uncle Cor' would buy (H., nos. 111-119, 121 & 125). He completed three more by the end of the month (H., nos. 122-124). One wonders at how 'Uncle Cor', whom one might presume had very traditional tastes, responded to Gas Tanks (H., no. 118), the most modern of the subjects that van Gogh depicted in his The Hague townscapes. Lacking any picturesque qualities, it is nonetheless a strong and confidently executed drawing, rendered in convincing perspective with a varied touch, and combining many details within a broadly expansive view. These are the very same qualities that van Gogh would bring to his mature landscape drawings at the end of the decade. In any case, 'Uncle Cor' commissioned further drawings, which van Gogh continued to work on into May. He began to heighten these drawings with white bodycolour. Among them were several backyard scenes, such as the well-known Carpenter's Yard and Laundry (H., no. 150; Rijkmuseum Kröller-Müller, Otterloo), that show extraordinary attention to the most prosaic details of daily living in The Hague's working-class neighbourhoods, even if, as van Gogh claimed in a letter to Theo, "I can see such drawings only as studies in perspective, and I therefore make them chiefly as a means of getting practice" (Letter T200).
In July, following his hospital stay and the move to the larger attic apartment, van Gogh travelled to Scheveningen, where in heightened watercolour he painted the bleaching grounds near the beach, and a fish-drying barn (H., nos. 158 and 160). Back at home on 21 July he painted the "fascinating view" from his attic window in Rooftops (H., no. 156). He was making remarkable progress, for he hoped to have ready a number of accomplished watercolours with which to impress Theo, who was planning to visit him in August. Van Gogh wrote to his brother, "Those I have done now are simply to show you that my studying drawing, correct perspective and proportions, helps me make progress in watercolours .... They are landscapes with complicated perspective, very difficult to draw, but for that reason there is a real Dutch character and sentiment in them ... The drawing is no less conscientious; but in addition these have colour - the soft green of the meadow contrasting with the red tile roof, the light in the sky contrasting more strongly with the somber tones of the foreground...." (Letter T219).
Van Gogh painted The Iron Mill about a week later, around 26 July. As de la Faille has noted (op. cit.), the scene shows the factory of Enghoven on the Zeike, a narrow canal on the outskirts of the city. In a letter sent to Theo during this time, van Gogh wrote, "When you come, I know a few beautiful paths through the meadows where it is so quiet and restful that I am sure you will like it. There I discovered old and new labourers' cottages and other houses that are characteristic, with little gardens by the water's edge, very cosy. I will go and draw there early tomorrow morning. It is a road that runs through the meadows of the Schenkweg to Enghoven's factory on the Zieke" (Letter T220). It is telling that van Gogh passed up the 'cosy' scene for a view of the unquestionably drab Enghoven factory. By now it is clear that while the artist might enjoy conventionally picturesque elements in the landscape, he had little interest in painting them. Instead he preferred the liveliness and complexity of the man-made landscape, the canals along which his countrymen conducted their commerce, and the buildings in which they produced their goods and made their livelihood. Van Gogh's inclination in this direction had been earlier influenced by the detailed realism of English illustrators, and, more recently, the paintings of urban street life by George Hendrik Breitner, a younger artist whom van Gogh had befriended in The Hague. Moreover, following his hospital stay, he immersed himself in the naturalism of the novelist Zola, who treated themes drawn from modern life, which he described in acutely observed detail.
Van Gogh had, during his lay evangelical ministry in 1878-1879, passionately sought to ameliorate the lives of the working poor who bore the brunt of the debilitating effects of the industrial revolution. Here he appears to accept industrialisation as a fact of modern life. Even if the iron factory belches forth smoke, it seems a far cry from 'the satanic mills' decried by the English poet William Blake, and van Gogh indeed seems fascinated by the effect. These pictures pre-figure the work of the politically-motivated French Neo-Impressionists, who were likewise drawn to the novelty of industrial and urban subjects. The urbanised landscape was, for van Gogh, foremost a visual feast, filled with abundantly varied shapes to render, and innumerable details to set down on paper. While his scenes are filled with visual information, they are, in their matter-of-factness, strangely serene, and only rarely project a sense of disturbance or disharmony. On occasion, van Gogh might editorialise, as in his attention to the cross-like dead tree in Pollard Willow, painted on 27 July (H., no. 164). More typically, however, the artist loved the sense of space in the flat, featureless Dutch landscape, and he perhaps used these distances as a way of creating an expansive and harmonious view of the world, in which there was room for man and nature, town and meadow to exist side by side.
Van Gogh's compassionate interest in the world around him was surely his means of offsetting a proclivity towards loneliness and isolation, feelings that were exacerbated by his idealism and lack of pragmatism. In this regard, his acceptance and embrace in his art of the world in its totality, be it factory or hayfield, mirrors his embrace of Sien, a woman in extremely compromised circumstances, with whom the artist found it increasingly difficult to live (van Gogh broke off their relationship when he left The Hague in September 1883). But it seems clear from this relationship, and the pictures that van Gogh painted during this period when he was 'setting out', that he was filling himself with experience in whatever way he could grasp, and in doing so, he sealed his commitment to art as his true life's work. He made his first oil paintings in mid-August, only a few weeks after painting The Iron Mill, following Theo's visit. He wrote to his brother, "I must tell that painting does not seem so strange to me as you would perhaps suppose; on the contrary, I like it very much, as it is a very strong means of expression. And at the same time I can express tender things with it too.... I am very glad I have the necessary materials, for already I had often supressed the desire to paint. It opens a much broader horizon" (Letter T224).