How to Read Paintings: Night Café by Vincent van Gogh

A compelling depiction of the night prowlers of Arles

Le café de nuit (The Night Café) by Vincent van Gogh. 1888. The Yale University Art Gallery, US. Image source The Yale University Art Gallery (open access)

Vincent van Gogh made this painting in early September 1888. It shows the interior of a tavern, a local bar populated by “night prowlers” as Van Gogh called them — people who “have no money to pay for a lodging, or are too drunk to be taken in.”