Van Gogh’s last painting poses problem for French village
Van Gogh’s final painting was disputed for decades, because he didn’t date his works. But in 2020 experts concluded that gnarled tree roots protruding from a hillside in Auvers are what is depicted in his “Tree Roots,” made on the day he died.
NEW DELHI: Auvers-sur-Oise, a village near Paris famed as an artist’s paradise, is also where Vincent van Gogh spent his final days and it has long drawn tourists to walk in the tortured painter’s last footsteps. But ever since art experts identified his final work before he took his life, there has been strife in the town.
Van Gogh’s final painting was disputed for decades, because he didn’t date his works. But in 2020 experts concluded that gnarled tree roots protruding from a hillside in Auvers are what is depicted in his “Tree Roots,” made on the day he died. This finding may have settled one dispute, but it immediately stirred another, this one between the municipality and the owners of the property where the roots grow.
The main root depicted in the painting — from a black locust tree and dubbed the “elephant” by enthusiasts — abuts a public road. After the discovery of its historical value, the municipality claimed a section of privately owned land near the road as public domain, saying it was necessary for maintenance. Jean-François and Hélène Serlinger, the property owners, fought the village, and an appeals court recently concluded there was no basis for the municipality’s claim.
But the mayor of Auvers, Isabelle Mézières, has pledged to keep fighting, and she can still appeal to a higher court. After the decision, she insisted that the site should belong to the public, not private owners. “The Roots belong to the Auversois!” she wrote on social media, referring to the citizens of the region. The continued fight over van Gogh’s tree roots has cast a pall over what is usually a celebratory season in Auvers, population 7,000, where art tourism is a big business that heats up in the spring. That the village has been depicted by other notable painters, including Pierre Auguste Renoir, Paul Cezanne and Camille Pissarro, has only added to its attraction. Its popularity is such that French transit authorities run a seasonal line from Paris, dubbed the “Impressionists’ Train,” and people come from afar to see what the local tourist board calls “the open-air museum that Auvers has become over time.”
The property owners say the conflict is endangering the historic site, as the mayor has blocked them and experts from properly protecting the roots since their significance was established. In a phone interview, Jean-François Serlinger accused the municipality of using the administrative case as a pretext for “an attempted takeover of a culturally significant site” and of simultaneously endangering the roots by “obstructing the installation of a permanent protective structure.”
The municipality and the mayor declined requests for comment. But it is perhaps fitting that these tree roots should be the subject of such a knotty dispute.
Van Gogh’s famous painting depicting the tangled roots shows “the struggle of life, and a struggle with death,” Wouter van der Veen, the researcher in France who identified the roots, said in 2020.
Last year, the Serlingers began opening their yard to visitors for tours.
Jean-François Serlinger insists the couple did not intend to make their yard into a destination and have not profited from the tours. Saturday was the start of the new tourist season. But the dispute has unsettled the property owners and raised concerns about the preservation of the roots.
