I had five nights in France, and I went on a quest to follow in the footsteps of Vincent van Gogh and see what saw that inspired his paintings. I’ve long been intrigued by the troubled painter and I figure I may understand him better by seeing some of the places he lived and worked.

Here’s what I found as I traveled through Paris, Arles, St. Remy, and Auvers to see the places that inspired van Gogh’s most revered art.

Paris

Paris is where van Gogh’s artistic journey began, and so it’s also where my journey begins.

Van Gogh loved Paris but found it stressful and difficult to keep up with societal norms.

“There is but one Paris and however hard living may be here, and if it became worse and harder even – the French air clears up the brain and does good – a world of good.”

By the time my madcap shuttle driver whipped me from the airport into the streets of Paris in an hour-long nightmare of hand gestures, BEEPING, dodging pedestrians, and cutting off other drivers, I understood the stress.

In 1895 when he lived with his brother Theo in Paris, his art started to change from dark and serious to its more recognizable form that most of us recognize on tote bags, magnets and umbrellas.

I walked the streets and stood before the scenes he painted. I could see how he’d have a hard time here. There’s so much noise, such fierce energy; it’d be disorienting for a sensitive, artistic soul, as his.

A Painting in a Sculpture Garden

Finding van Gogh’s work takes some effort as they’re scattered with a few exceptions. I paid € 12 to get into the Musee Rodin, the former home of sculptor Auguste Rodin (The Thinker, The Gates of Hell), to see van Gogh’s third and final painting of Père Tanguy.

Tanguy (real first name Julien) was his paint supplier in Paris. Many artists of that time paid him in trade, van Gogh among them. Tanguy was a smart man.

ATELIER DES LUMIERES

I went to the Atelier Lumieres van Gogh Starry Night experiential exhibit in Paris in a former iron foundry from the 1800s.

The production immerses visitors in van Gogh’s most celebrated paintings in a timeline of their creation in a visual and musical accompaniment projected across the foundry walls.

The music, featuring songs by Janis Joplin and a revision of The Animals, “I’m just a soul whose intentions are good,” brings a swell of emotion into the presentation.

Eleven different spectacular venues around France host the exhibit, and you can attend for € 14.50 (I also attended Carrieres Lumieres in Les Baux de Provence). These are now hosted across America too.

Calendars, coffee cups, pencils, scarves, t-shirts

I love the current adoration for van Gogh and seeing his work depicted on everything possible, but I can’t help but think how, while he lived, he was shunned and an outcast among society “selling” only one painting in his lifetime (The Red Vineyard to Anna Boch).

“I can’t change the fact that my paintings don’t sell. But the time will come when people will recognize that they are worth more than the value of the paints used in the picture.”

Musee d’Orsay

The d’Orsay museum has a big, and I think the best collection of van Goghs outside of the van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam.

The view when entering is worth € 14 alone. From its time as a train station, the vast domed glass ceiling is a sight to behold.

“Why, I ask myself, shouldn’t the shining dots of the sky be as accessible as the black dots on the map of France?”

The first room opens with Starry Night Over the Rhone, and directly next to it the Church at Auvers. I enjoyed listening as visitors walked in behind me and actually caught their breath upon the sight. I was among them.

A Road South in Search of the Light

I take the train to Avignon, south of France, as Vincent did. He often talked in his letters about the warm, bright southern light and how the color has a different quality than the north’s cool light.

“Ah, those who don’t believe in the sun down here are truly blasphemous.”

Tiny Villages

We fly past French vineyards covered with a light cloth and tiny villages with moss-covered steeples. Cows and sheep graze in the lush green fields.

I listened to the announcements about station stops, but they were only in French, so I had to go by instinct as I did not understand a word. The further I go from Paris, the fewer people speak English, and I wonder how I will manage my travels with my dismal French. In Avignon, I rented a car.

Arles

Vincent lived in this Roman outpost from 1888 to 1889 and produced over 300 paintings and drawings while there. Some of his most beloved work comes from this time. He’d planned to set up a ‘Studio of the South’ in Arles for a group of artists whose work his brother Theo could sell in Paris.

The only artist who stayed there with Vincent in the yellow house on Place Lamartine was Paul Gauguin. That relationship quickly went sour and ended tragically with the “ear incident.”

The little yellow house is no longer there; it was bombed and destroyed during the war. However, the art he created there, including van Gogh’s chair, Bedroom in Arles, The Night Cafe, Starry Night Over the Rhone, Cafe Terrace at Night, Sunflowers, and many others live on.

It all seems familiar

The paintings give the city an enduring, memorable quality. To see what van Gogh created gives an expectation of the place, it can’t live up to. It just pales by comparison.

I walked along the Rhone River and saw the light shine across the water as he did. I stopped at the Night Cafe and marveled at the ancient churches and fields.

Many of the buildings date to the first century B.C. and are listed as UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Much of it is dilapidated and forlorn. The beauty and life in van Gogh’s pictures existing perhaps only in his mind and now his paintings.

He imbued special magic into what he saw. He saw something more than what is there. I could see how that would make you crazy.

Saint Remy de Provence

Fearing his mental illness, van Gogh had himself voluntarily admitted to Saint-Paul-de-Mausole psychiatric hospital in Saint Rémy.

These little old towns can be a challenge to navigate. The GPS directed me to a non-paved path; the car wouldn’t fit down but you’d be amazed at what passes for a street here. Once I arrive at the asylum, I get the car stuck on a hill. Boy, you could smell those gears cooking after five minutes. I tried to stay calm and non-emotional … the asylum is still functional.

It’s as if I know this place

The grounds feel immediately familiar and it takes a moment for the reason to set in. You’ve seen this before. He painted everything in the gardens and surrounding land.

Then, for just €6, you may enter van Gogh’s former room above the courtyard stairs. With just a single bed, a small desk, chair, and trunk, his room is humbling and evocative.

Here he painted irises, cypresses, olive trees, Starry Night, and many others. This is where we see him start to paint in swirls and whorls.

I’d often wondered why the cypresses figured so prominently in his work and seeing this place answers that question. The cypresses are in every sightline. He couldn’t avoid them.

To be here is, essentially, to see his paintings in real life – still the same as when he painted – is startling and special.

Lumieres in a Cave

While in Provence, I opted to see van Gogh at Carrieres Lumieres up the road high in the mountains in a former sandstone quarry.

Saint Remy is mountainous with blasts of rock and color, so stunning you’re better off if someone else is driving.

The immersive multimedia show takes place inside a soaring cavern of limestone. Van Gogh’s paintings are animated and projected across the walls and floor of the rock.

The presentation is enthralling and awe-inspiring—far superior to the Atelier Lumieres in the Paris foundry.

Auvers

After leaving the asylum Vincent moved to Auvers-Sur-Oise, just north of Paris, in 1890.

I don’t know what it took him to get there, but it took me a train, two metro, another train, and a bus.

“And I already feel that it did me good to go South, the better to see the North … I’d almost believe that these canvases will tell you what I can’t say in words …”

In Auvers, Vincent created Field with Poppies, wheat fields, Daubigny’s Garden, and the familiar Auvers houses and haystacks, among others.

It’s a small town, and I walked alone toward the cemetery up on the hill. Up a narrow-cobbled walk where I circled the backside of a church. As I rounded the front, I recognized the famed Church at Auver-Sur-Oise (see church painting above).

Finding Vincent’s Grave

It seems easier and quieter among the wheat fields and the churches; I could see him happy here, but still, he wasn’t.

A little way up a hill, there is a small cemetery encircled by a stone wall. A wrought iron fence allows entry. There was nobody around and I walked slowly through the entire place looking for his grave.

Vincent was buried with his brother Theo, who died just six months after him. I knew the van Gogh graves were along the wall, so I started on the right and found them three-quarters of the way through.

Two Simple Stones and Sunflower

They had two simple tombstones side by side. Someone had left a sunflower.

“Someday death will take us to another star.”

He shot himself in the chest with a handgun, refused medical treatment and died two days later in his rented room above the Ravoux family inn with his brother by his side. There has been much speculation about how he actually died, but nonetheless, on July 29, 1890, he was gone.

After paying my respects, I walked back toward the train and prepared for home.

I wanted to explore van Gogh more deeply in France; to walk where he walked, stand where he stood, and I have. This journey, far from satisfying, has left me longing and filled with a passion for his work and a need for understanding I cannot rid myself of.

Perhaps, I found him after all.

• Visit Musee Rodin, 19 boulevard des Invalides, 75007 Paris; +01 44 18 61 10
• See Atelier Lumieres, 38 rue Saint Maur 75011 Paris; +33 1 80 98 46 00
• Visit Musee d’Orsay, 1 rue de la Légion d’Honneur, 75007 Paris; +33 (0)1 40 49 48 14
• Visit Saint-Paul-de-Mausole asylum, 2 Voie Communale des Carrières, 13210 Saint-Rémy-de-Provence; +33 4 90 92 77 00
• See Carrieres Lumieres, route de Maillane 13520 Les Baux de Provence; +33 4 90 49 20 02
• Pay respects at van Gogh’s grave: Avenue du Cimetière, Auvers-sur-Oise

Read more stories about France here.

Let’s Connect on Social Media and Email