Have you ever thought how hard it must be to cut off your ear?

Most forms of bodily mutilation seem to be quite easy to pull off; get drunk, get pierced, look cool. Or not, depending on what you had pierced.

But to chop your ear off, that takes time and determination. Even the Japanese Yakuza who ceremonially chop off a little finger learn that it hurts AFTER but an ear has gristle and sinew and has to take time to chop off; it has to hurt DURING. Lots of chances to think about whether it was such a smart idea to start with.

Well that is the thought that occupied me as we walked around St. Remy de Provence, where Vincent Van Gogh spent a year or so in hospital after a couple of psychotic episodes and the well know ear chopping business. Here he painted most of the stuff that we all know and hang to brighten up our dining rooms, kitchen nooks, dorm rooms, and place mats; pictures of starry starry nights, fading irises, and lots of peasants doing what peasants did back then in the sun; digging, reaping, sleeping.

These photos include the view he would have had from his bedroom, the cloisters in the abbey/hospital, and a view of the Alpilles; a rocky slash across Provence that was the backdrop to most of his landscapes.

Further reading: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint-Paul_Asylum,_Saint-R%C3%A9my_(Van_Gogh_series) Colin Evans colin.pdx@gmail.com (503)853-3348