Location📍 Kröller-Müller Museum → Not currently on display

Terrace of a Café at Night (Place du Forum)

Vincent van Gogh had intended to make a nocturnal painting for some time. Rather than following the conventional manner wrapped in shades of black and grey, he actually executed it with an abundance of colours. He painted this gas-lit terrace of a café in Arles in situ and in the dark, which was highly unconventional because colours have a different appearance during the night than by day.

The most eye-catching aspect of this masterpiece is the sharp contrast between the warm yellow, green, and orange colours under the marquise and the deep blue of the starry sky. This visual impact is reinforced by the dark blue of the houses in the background. Van Gogh was pleased with this calculated effect, noting that an abundance of gaslight, which is yellow and orange, intensifies blue.

In a letter to his sister Wil, he expressed his immense enjoyment, stating, "I enormously enjoy painting on the spot at night." The precision of his keen observation is borne out by later astronomical research, which confirms that he painted the constellations precisely as they appeared on the night of 16 or 17 September 1888.