Painted in June 1889, The Starry Night is perhaps the most famous view from a window in art history. Looking out from his barred room at the Saint-Paul-de-Mausole asylum in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, Vincent van Gogh captured not a literal landscape, but a turbulent projection of his inner state. Unlike his earlier works created en plein air, this masterpiece was painted during the day from memory and imagination, representing a rare departure from his strict observation of nature.

The Starry Night
472.1941
Vincent van Gogh
June 1889
The Museum of Modern Art

The composition is dominated by the violent, swirling energy of the sky, rendered in his signature thick impasto. These churning currents are anchored by the dark, flame-like silhouette of a cypress tree in the foreground—a traditional symbol of mourning and death. Below, the sleeping village is peaceful, featuring a church spire that evokes his Dutch homeland rather than the French countryside, proving the scene is a composite of memory and emotion. The brightest point of light, just to the right of the cypress, is actually Venus, the "morning star," which Van Gogh described seeing in his letters. This work defines Post-Impressionism: the use of colour and form to express emotional truth rather than visual accuracy.

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