Plum and I went to London last week. Just the two of us. We went midweek and without agenda – just a little get-away to visit with a dear friend and be in the city. It was wonderful. I think that 6 months is a great stage for travel. We are still in the glorious portable stage – just pre-crawling so content to sit on my knee and ride along in a wrap all day. Solid foods have yet to play a dietary role – they are a game at this stage. Crusts of bread to offer distraction from sore gums, tastes of yoghurt and soup to see what spoons are about, anyway. Milk solves everything. And being somewhere new is just plain fantastic at that age. I mean that. I love watching him watching. I think that my Plum’s eyes were wide open for most of our jaunt. It was as if he couldn’t quite believe this amazing new place I’d taken him. He was so full of wonder at the novelty of it all. Which made him rather appealing to all the cold Londoners and softened gazes everywhere we went. People stopped and spoke to us because of those eyes. I heard so many stories from total strangers about parents, kids, being little and hoping for little ones. Wonderful.
My one goal for the trip was to see the sunflowers. The National Gallery is currently displaying two of Vincent Van Gogh’s sunflowers paintings. Van Gogh painted four versions of the sunflowers in August and September 1888 in preparation for Paul Gauguin’s arrival at his house in Arles in the south of France. He hoped to start an artists’ colony, and Gauguin was the beginning of this dream. Later, after the collapse of this dream, Van Gogh revisited the sunflowers and made copies of these paintings, experimenting with new colours. The London sunflowers belongs to the original group and the Amsterdam version is a later interpretation. In August 1888, Van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo.
‘I am hard at it, painting with the enthusiasm of a Marseillais eating bouillabaisse, which won’t surprise you when you know that what I’m at is the painting of some sunflowers. If I carry out this idea there will be a dozen panels. So the whole thing will be a symphony in blue and yellow. I am working at it every morning from sunrise on, for the flowers fade so quickly. I am now on the fourth picture of sunflowers.’
I felt so lucky to experience these paintings first hand. I love that someone had the imagination to offer this free exhibit, taking seriously the impact of these two similar canvases, and also that the gallery prepared the place and staff to welcome the daily crowds. Despite the interest, the sunflower room is never overcrowded because the gallery ensures that there is space and time for everyone. Line-ups are well managed. And, generously, there’s no limit as to how long you can stay. I could have stayed all afternoon.
I’d love to say that Plum loved the sunflowers, too. That he engaged with the colour or even just gazed thoughtfully in the right direction. But he just slept right through, his lovely head heavy on my chest, his hair soft and pale and close. And that was perfect, too. It was enough that I could be there with the sunflowers and see the brightnesses of that splendid yellow.
Two thoughts stay with me. First, as Van Gogh himself mentioned, that flowers are fleeting. These paintings are his attempt to capture their moment. He painted quickly, without plan or sketch. He brought all that he had into the moment to be present with the sunflowers’ beauty and tried to preserve something fleeting.
Then there is the idea of return and re-entry. The Amsterdam sunflowers were painted while Van Gogh was hospitalised for mental illness. Compositionally, it is a copy of the London version -14 sunflowers gathered into a vase, the same arrangement. Colouring of flowers, vase and wall are different, but the moment captured is the same. I wonder why he chose to paint these flowers again. Perhaps he say it as a chance to fix or enhance something from the first. Perhaps as a way to re-enter the creative space in which he had first painted them.
So these are the two postcards I send home. On one, the chance to try something again. On the other, a reminder to capture fleeting beauty around us. And both are awash with dazzling yellow.
