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Why does The Starry Night include a village that was not outside Vincent van Gogh’s window?
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Vincent van Gogh
Self-Portrait, oil on artist's board on cradled panel by Vincent van Gogh, 1887; in the Art Institute of Chicago.
Vincent van Gogh painted The Starry Night in 1889 while staying at the Saint-Paul-de-Mausole asylum near Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, France. Although he observed the night sky from his barred bedroom window, he was not permitted to paint inside his room.12
Because he was restricted from painting on-site and preferred working from direct observation, he had to rely on memory, drawings, and his imagination to complete the work. Consequently, the small village depicted in the painting did not actually exist outside his window; he used his imagination to include it as a structured, calm element within the composition.12