A painting a day · No. 32 of 38
The Starry Night
Vincent van Gogh (1853–1890)
1889 · Oil on canvas · Museum of Modern Art, New York
The story
Painted at the asylum in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, where Van Gogh had admitted himself. It is the view from his window before sunrise — but painted by day, from memory. The village and the cypress were added from his imagination.
Look closer
- The dark cypress tree in front joins the earth to the sky.
- The big swirl in the middle of the sky.
- The brightest 'star', just above the horizon, is probably Venus, the morning star. He wrote about seeing it.
Did you know
He did not think much of it himself. MoMA acquired it in 1941.
Why we can show it
Vincent van Gogh died in 1890. UK copyright lasts for the artist’s life plus 70 years, so even under today’s rules this painting would have been free for anyone to show since 1961. The photograph is a faithful copy of a flat work, which creates no new copyright. We do not store the picture: it comes from Wikimedia Commons each time it is needed. More on this.