Irises, Saint-Paul Asylum Garden — Vincent van Gogh, 1889

Van Gogh painted irises at the Saint-Paul-de-Mausole asylum in May 1889, pressing the blooms together in a dense botanical arrangement — the garden that was both his subject and his world for that year. The irises appeared in his letters as a sign of recovery: their presence meant something. A close, concentrated study from one of the most sustained periods of work in his career. From the Vincent van Gogh collection.