“What I’m most passionate about, much much more than all the rest in my profession—is the portrait, the modern portrait,” Vincent van Gogh wrote in June 1890. Although predominantly known for his landscapes, from 1888 to 1889, Van Gogh devoted himself to creating a series of portraits of one family, the Roulins. The Arles postman Joseph Roulin, his wife Augustine, and their three children, Armand, Camille, and Marcelle, inspired an astonishing set of twenty-six painted portraits plus multiple drawings by Van Gogh, while also being cherished friends to the artist. 

This book offers the first in depth exploration of this group of works which Van Gogh hoped would express “the model’s thoughts, his soul,” and comment about human existence in a more universal sense. Relying on letters from the artist, archival material, contemporary criticsm, and technical studies, Van Gogh: The Roulin Family Portraits features insightful essays on Van Gogh’s practice, his beliefs about portraiture, his personal relationship with the Roulins, and his admiration for his contemporaries as well as seventeenth-century Dutch portraitists.