The Yellow House.

Today, for the first time, I visited the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam.  I have been to the city enough times now that I really have no excuse for waiting so long.

Except that maybe it was worth the wait.

Today I saw, really saw- witnessed, studied, carefully calculated- a piece called "The Yellow House."

It is the kind of image that stays with you.  

At least with me.  

I've never really identified with Van Gogh- not really.  Give me Degas and his dancers.  Give me Sargent and all of his portrait subjects.  Give me Monet and his studies of women with umbrellas.  These, to me, were the men of their ages- they were the gifted ones.  The important ones.  The dancers are strong in their femininity; the subjects unusual in their individuality; the women powerful in the wind and the world.  The artists are great in their art.

Today Van Gogh was added to that list- for the mysticism of this homestead.

There is something about this piece, something so utterly captivating to me.  I keep a journal of every place that I travel- a literal scrap book of receipts, business cards, brochures, buttons- things I find on the street, things I know will remind me years and years later of the (mis)adventure's I've had.  It's a little silly and a little time consuming, but it's worth it for the future remembrances.  Anyway, I've been made fun of more than a few times over these journals, but every now and again I write something, some snippet of an experience, that I cannot replicate anywhere else:

I fell madly in love with one piece in particular: "The Yellow house" or "The Street."  It's so beautiful and haunting... like the image of a place I never knew I wanted to visit or live- a place in my memory that I've never been to or seen before today.  I want to see that place for real.  I want to stand where Van Gogh stood as he saw the house on the street corner and desired it.  I desire this place. 

And even though it's nothing now (the house suffered during World War II and was later demolished because it was so inhabitable), it's still something.  I look at this painting and the saturation in the yellow and blue of it engage me; the density of the brush strokes enliven me.  I look at this painting and will myself to disappear inside of it- so that I can breathe in the mustiness of an old French building; so that I can smell the fresh air and coffee and bread made by hand; so I can run my fingers along soft wooden tables and chairs; so that my memory can match my imagination.

And though I am heartbroken that I will never get to go there, it soothes me to know that it was there, for a time.  And forever, in that painting.