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Art History in Schools CIO | Registered Charity No. 1164651
An artist needs to experience nature at first hand in order
to represent it successfully SAMPLE ESSAY
‘An artist needs to experience nature at first hand in order to represent it successfully.’ How
far do you agree?
Plan
• Introduction: decode the question
• Landscapes:
o personal experience: Van Gogh Wheatfield with crows, 1890, Van Gogh
Museum, Amsterdam
o constructed: Claude Hagar and the Angel, 1646, National Gallery
o or Agnes Denes Wheatfield – A Confrontation, Manhattan
• Animals:
o for scientific record Mansur’s Zebra 1621, V&A,
o constructed: Durer’s Rhinoceros, 1515, British Museum
• Conclusion: final judgement
The broad term of nature includes both landscapes and flora and fauna. None of these subjects
played a major role in the traditional mainstream of European art before the 17th century and so
interest has often been associated with scientific development and an increasing awareness of
place and a sense of belonging. The element of ‘success’, however is much more subjective and
is open to interpretation.
The Dutch, Post Impressionist painter, Vincent Van Gogh painted ‘Wheatfield with crows’ in
1890 as one of his final works. At the time, he was living in Auvers and had spent many hours
in these fields of corn, as evidenced in his letters to his brother, Theo. His aim was to capture
“the vast stretches of wheat under troubled skies.” This suggests that although his experience
of the landscape was both real and at first hand, his use of it was filtered through his own
subjective experience. The composition of a double square is panoramic and is combined with
an unusually high horizon line which has the effect of exaggerating the effort required to
‘conquer’ this landscape. The image is cropped suggesting that the wheat extends further.
Colour is used descriptively with blue sky and yellow corn, but the saturated hues selected by
Van Gogh exaggerate the emotional experience and suggestion of an imminent storm (both
literal and psychological). Complementary tones heighten this discomfort with red paths/green
vegetation in addition to the blue/yellow combination. Impasto brushwork and directional
strokes add to the idea of distance (longer in the foreground and increasingly choppy and dark
in the background) but more importantly, emphasise the practice of mark making rather than
the reality of nature. This might also be suggested by the conflicting directions of the wheat
blown to the right while the clouds move to the left. The crows are simply silhouetted as angular
V shapes again suggesting that Van Gogh’s main priority is not of ‘first hand’ accuracy but of
a “symbolic” purpose (Kenneth Clarke). As Van Gogh is one of the most popular and familiar
