Van Gogh's Gardens

Book excerpt: Of the passions driving Vincent Van Gogh's extraordinary art, one of the greatest was his abiding preoccupation with flowers, gardens and the natural landscape. Living in poverty, however, he was never able to translate the breathtaking visions on his canvas into an actual garden. Now, thanks to Derek Fell's marvellous images, insightful writing and reverent adherence to Van Gogh's original botanical ideas, Van Gogh's gardens have finally come to brilliant life. Drawing inspiration from his dazzling paintings of sunflowers, irises and Provencal landscapes as well as from the eloquent letters he wrote to his brother and sister about colour harmonies and planting ideas, Fell has lovingly created and photgraphed the living embodiment of Van Gogh's singular reflections on colour and nature. More than 130 original colour photographs show the roots of his ideas in the French landscape today and reveal exactly how those ideas will look in our own backyards, including contemporary gardens that embrace such unconventional, Van Gogh-inspired pairings as geraniums with poppies and heliotrope with roses. The book also showcase twenty of the master's most stunning paintings of landscapes and flowers.