Brief Report

This painting, described by the artist himself as a study (étude), was painted in Clichy to the north of Paris, and was the first of van Gogh’s works to have been painted in France and chosen by the art- ist to appear in an exhibition in his Dutch homeland. In spring 1988 it was put on sale by the dealer Tersteeg in The Hague for 150 francs, before being returned to Paris as unsaleable [LT 471 (fig. 12), LT W 4; Tempel 1999, p.118].

Van Gogh used a presumably pre-primed canvas in the standard F 10 size, whose open weave was similar to what was then generally available as a toile étude or pochade, i.e. a study canvas. The ground is cream in colour, with a slight yellow cast, and recalls the toned écru or jaune grounds from the range of products then on offer (fig. 7).

As an aid to composition, van Gogh used what he called his perspective frame, whose use has already been proved in twelve more paintings by him in 1887 and now in the Amsterdam Van Gogh Museum [Hendriks 2005, p. 473]. The striking lines in the frame, in the Union Jack pattern, along with a subsequent underdrawing in pencil, can be seen even with the naked eye (fig. 7), but are brought out much better with infrared reflectography (fig. 6). The precise appearance and method of use of the perspective frame are described in the Brief Report on van Gogh’s Langlois Drawbridge (WRM 1197) and in Hendriks 2005.

Particularly striking in the Bridge at Clichy is the dynamic, sketch-like, almost hectic line-drawing of the pencil underdrawing of houses, bridge, reflections in the water, shadows, grasses and figures, which in places has been corrected several times, drawing attention to changes in the position of the roofs and the arch of the bridge. The subsequent paint application was carried out briskly wet-in-wet in one or two layers, and with little use of impasto (fig. 3). It is possible that the artist even felt that the paint in the sky was too thick in places, because here he used a broad palette knife to remove much of the still-wet paint (fig. 8).

All in all, the sketch-like character of the paint application means that we can discern all the stages of development of the finished work, beginning with the ground, via the underdrawing to the individual revisions. The use of the perspective frame and the rapid development of the underdrawing and the paint application speak in favour of the conclusion that the picture was painted entirely en plein air.

Vincent van Gogh
Bridge at Clichy, 1887, oil on canvas, 54.8 x 46.1 cm, WRM Dep. FC 813

Vincent van Gogh

born on 30 March 1853 in Groot-Zundert (today: Zundert) near Breda, Netherlands,
died on 29 July 1890 in Auvers-sur-Oise, France

Brief report with complete data as downloadable pdf-file

Further illustrations:

Fig. 02

Verso, lined


Fig. 03

Raking light


Fig. 04


Fig. 05

UV fluorescence


Fig. 06

Infrared reflectography


Fig. 07

Detail of pencil underdrawing, reflection in the water in bottom left-hand corner


Fig. 08

Raking light, detail of top right-hand corner, traces of removal of still-wet paint (red arrow marks where the palette knife was applied)


Fig. 09

Detail from middle of picture, trace of where a brush was wiped in the wet paint


Fig. 10

Detail of pencil underdrawing, figure was gone over with
powerful yellow brushstrokes


Fig. 11

Grasses in the foreground, viridian and copper green,
microscopic photograph (M = 1 mm)


Fig. 12

Detail of letter to Theo dated 24 March 1888 (LT 471) with drawn sketch of the painting