1. Theo’s letter must have contained his reaction to the draft letter to Gauguin that Vincent had enclosed with letter 616. We can infer from ‘still’ that Theo had raised objections to the plan.

a. Read: ‘puisqu’on’.

2. The drawing he sent is Fishing boats on the beach at Saintes-Maries (F 1428 / JH 1458 ); the painting of the same subject is Fishing boats on the beach at Saintes-Maries (F 413 / JH 1460 ), but this measures 65 x 81.5 cm and is therefore a no. 25 ‘figure’ canvas. Van Gogh made a watercolour after the drawing first: Fishing boats on the beach at Saintes-Maries (F 1429 / JH 1459). See exhib. cat. Amsterdam 2005, p. 186. View of Saintes-Maries (F 1439 / JH 1446 ) – the same size as F 1428 – may also have been in the consignment of drawings; it emerges from the rest of the letter that the batch also included drawings of cottages (see n. 3).

3. Two drawings of cottages that Van Gogh kept back were Row of cottages in Saintes-Maries (F 1434 / JH 1449 ) and Cottages in Saintes-Maries (F 1438 / JH 1448 ). He used them as preliminary studies for the paintings Row of cottages in Saintes-Maries (F 420 / JH 1462 ) and Cottages in Saintes-Maries (F 419 / JH 1465 ). The more detailed drawing Cottages in Saintes-Maries (F 1440 / JH 1451 ) must also have been among the ‘more carefully drawn ones’ that he hung on to. He did, though, probably send Theo Sunlit cottages in Saintes-Maries (F 1437 / JH 1450 ) and Cottages in Saintes-Maries (F 1436 / JH 1454 ); these could be described as ‘a bit harsh’ (l. 28). See cat. Amsterdam 2007, p. 126. The drawings Fishing boats off the beach at Saintes-Maries (F 1432 / JH 1455 ) and View of Saintes-Maries with cemetery (F 1479 / JH 1456 ) may also have been in the consignment.

4. Fishing boats at sea (F 415 / JH 1452 ) and Fishing boats at sea (F 417 / JH 1453 ). We learn from letter 619 that Van Gogh wanted to leave the seascapes behind in Saintes-Maries to dry, but as far as we know he did not go back to the coast. It is not entirely clear whether he took the paintings back to Arles with him after all or had them sent on later; the wording in the present letter would seem to point to the former. In letter 636 he reports that the studies are not dry yet. Theo did not receive the seascapes until mid-August, when they were sent with some thirty other studies (see letter 660).

5. Van Gogh is referring to the organizers of the second exhibition of the Nederlandsche Etsclub, among them Jan Veth of Dordrecht, who had asked Theo to lend works. See letter 611, n. 5. Theo was prepared to let him have ‘some 50 etchings and 20 drawings’ for the exhibition, but Veth evidently only wanted work by established artists: he wrote that he was not really looking for ‘the very latest thing’ but for ‘the best of the school that you [i.e. Theo] champion with such great judgement’ (FR b3574).

b. Read: ‘vivre’.

6. Van Gogh may have gleaned his knowledge of the speed with which Japanese artists drew from Louis Gonse, who praised their swift, powerful style of drawing in his influential book L’Art japonais (1883). On Hokusai he wrote: ‘When Hokousaï draws an engraving, he is concise, swift, impulsive, often brutal ... His brush seems to take on an ethereal quality as it follows the amorous flows of his thoughts in a sort of voluptuous delight. Hokousaï then has the ingenuity of a tender soul, soaring above the noisy world; he has the refinement and strokes of genius which only come to an imagination overwhelmed with colour, light and truth.’ (Hokousaï, lorsqu’il dessine pour la gravure, sera concis, rapide, prime-sautier, souvent brutale ... Il semble que son pinceau s’immatérialise pour suivre dans une sorte de délectation voluptueuse les mouvements amoureux de sa pensée. Alors Hokousaï a les ingénuités d’une âme tendre, envolée au-dessus des bruits du monde; il a des raffinements et des trouvailles qui ne viennent qu’à une imagination éperdue de couleur, de lumière et de vérité) (ed. Paris 1886, pp. 101-102).

7. On Van Gogh’s knowledge and use of the perspective frame: letter 235, n. 10 and cat. Amsterdam 2010.

8. See for the artists of the ‘Petit Boulevard’: letter 584, n. 6.

9. This must be a reference to the art collector and connoisseur of Oriental art Albert Goupil, the son of Adolphe Goupil. Albert was a member of the board of Goupil & Cie between 1872 and 1884, and he and his father were sleeping partners (‘commanditaire’) in the new firm of Boussod, Valadon & Cie. See Etat des lieux 1994, pp. 150-151.

10. The rue de la Paix in Paris runs from the Opéra to place Vendôme. This chic shopping street housed art dealers (including Durand-Ruel), fashion houses and jewellers.

11. In his early days in Arles Van Gogh worked in a style that was related to the Cloisonnism of Bernard and Anquetin (see letter 588). His comment that Anquetin and Toulouse-Lautrec would not like his work suggests that he was aware that he had meanwhile taken a different path. Although he, too, took his inspiration from the Japanese examples, unlike Anquetin and Toulouse-Lautrec he made great use of impasto and he painted outdoors. This is related to what he wrote in letter 596 to Bernard (whom he does not mention here, possibly because he was in Brittany and consequently could not see Vincent’s work at Theo’s).

12. Edouard Dujardin, ‘Aux XX et aux Indépendants. Le cloisonnisme’, La Revue Indépendante 6 (March 1888), no. 17, pp. 487-492. Dujardin calls Anquetin’s submission for the exhibitions of Les Vingt and the Indépendants ‘the first appearance of a rather new and special manner’ (la première manifestation d’une manière assez nouvelle et spéciale), and compares his paintings with Japanese art and the ‘images d’Epinal’, cheap, coloured, popular prints. The new style is characterized by ‘the strict distinction between drawing and colouring ... And the task of the painter will be something like painting in compartments, as in cloisonné work, and his technique will be a sort of cloisonnism’ (la distinction très rigoureuse du dessin et de la coloration. ... Et le travail du peintre sera quelque chose comme une peinture par compartiments, analogue au cloisonné, et sa technique consistera en une sorte de cloisonnisme). Cf. also letter 575, n. 7.

13. The painting of boats is Fishing boats on the beach at Saintes-Maries (F 413 / JH 1460 ) mentioned above. The Pont de Langlois could refer to either of two works: The Langlois bridge with washerwomen (F 397 / JH 1368 ) and The Langlois bridge with washerwomen (F 571 / JH 1392 ). The former was originally intended as a gift for H.G. Tersteeg, but in the end he did not get it (cf. letter 615, n. 2). The Langlois bridge (F 400 / JH 1371 ), in which the colours were originally brighter, is also a possibility.