The Restaurant Carrel in Arles

The Restaurant Carrel in Arles (1888) depicts one of the establishment where Van Gogh ate regularly during his Arles period — the kind of modest Provençal dining room that provided the social context for his daily existence in the city. He was interested in the interiors of Arles eating places as spaces of ordinary social life: the specific quality of Provençal cooking smells and the sound of conversation in the southern accent he found charming and distinctive. The Restaurant Carrel paintings are counterparts to the Night Café series — where the Night Café was charged with nocturnal menace and the colour of despair, the restaurant interiors convey the quotidian warmth of midday meals and ordinary human interaction. Van Gogh's documentation of Arles's social geography through its eating and drinking places is one of the most specific aspects of his year in the city. Current location unknown.

The restaurant interior or exterior is rendered with Van Gogh's mature Arles palette — warmer and more intense than his Paris work. The specific architectural and commercial character of the establishment is captured with observational directness. His brushwork combines descriptive accuracy with the expressive energy characteristic of the Arles period.