Two Diggers among Trees

Van Gogh's Two Diggers Among Trees, painted at Saint-Rémy in 1889 and now at the Detroit Institute of Arts, belongs to his late series of labor subjects made partly from Millet prints and partly from direct observation of workers in the asylum grounds. Two figures digging among trees — the labor of turning earth beneath established vegetation — was a subject that connected his ongoing interest in agricultural labor to the specific landscape of his confinement. The Detroit Institute of Arts holds a distinguished collection of European and American art, and this Van Gogh is among its important Post-Impressionist holdings.

The two figures are placed within a setting of trees, the relationship between the human figures and the established vegetation carefully observed. Van Gogh's Saint-Rémy technique animates the trees' trunks and branches with characteristic swirling strokes while the figures are rendered with more direct, controlled observation. His palette uses the warm ochres of turned earth against the greens and blues of the surrounding trees and sky.