Vin­cent Van Gogh remains per­haps the most rep­re­sen­ta­tive, in the pub­lic imag­i­na­tion, of the “tor­tured genius”. Nev­er suc­cess­ful as an artist in his life­time, he suf­fered from bouts of psy­chot­ic delu­sions and men­tal insta­bil­i­ty, includ­ing that noto­ri­ous episode in which he took a razor to his left ear. Ulti­mate­ly, he took his own life: in 1890 he shot him­self in the chest with a revolver and died from his injuries two days lat­er. He was 37. But my, what an artis­tic lega­cy he left, and what tremen­dous glob­al fame he would achieve, posthumously…if he had only had an inkling!

Today, when we think of Van Gogh, a num­ber of his paint­ings spring to mind. There is his Sun­flower series (take your pick, there are many dif­fer­ent ver­sions), paint­ed in 1888 and 1889 with the gus­to, in Vincent’s own words, of a “Mar­seil­lais eat­ing bouil­l­abaisse”. There is The Star­ry Night (famous­ly name-checked in the open­ing line of Don McLean’s song, Vin­cent), paint­ed in 1889 and depict­ing the view from Vincent’s room in the asy­lum at Saint-Rémy-de-Provence. There are his many self-por­traits (over 30, with and with­out ban­daged left ear). Or per­haps his won­der­ful­ly (and decep­tive­ly) child-like Bed­room at Arles.

There is one of Van Gogh’s paint­ings in par­tic­u­lar, how­ev­er, that appeals to my imag­i­na­tion the most, and that is his Café Ter­race at Night. Depict­ing a late-night cof­fee house in the Place du Forum in Arles, it brings togeth­er all the ele­ments of Van Gogh’s tal­ents in one won­der­ful­ly evoca­tive scene. Bathed in the light of a huge yel­low lantern, the café looks like the per­fect place to spend a warm summer’s eve, doesn’t it? I could wile away an hour or two there, watch­ing the world go by, no prob­lem!

An intense yel­low sat­u­rates the cafe and its awning, and projects beyond the café onto the cob­ble­stones of the street, which takes on a vio­let-pink tinge. The street leads away into the dark­ness under a blue sky stud­ded with larg­er-than-life stars. Dash­es of green from the tree in the top-right and the low­er wall of the café, along with the orange ter­ra­cot­ta of the café floor, add to the sat­is­fy­ing palette of this paint­ing. Van Gogh wrote that “the night is more alive and more rich­ly coloured than the day”, and on the strength of this piece I can see what he means.