The Garden with Flowers 1888

Vincent van Gogh made this drawing, "The Garden with Flowers," with pen and ink on paper. The composition pulls us into a high-contrast world of black and white, where every detail is rendered with rapid strokes, creating a dense, almost vibrating surface. Van Gogh's use of line is particularly striking. It is not merely descriptive but constitutive, building form and texture through hatching and cross-hatching. Notice how the repetitive, directional strokes create a sense of movement and energy, almost as if the garden is alive and teeming with unseen forces. This method recalls structuralist principles, in which meaning emerges not from isolated elements but from their relationships within a system. The high vantage point and the compression of space flatten the perspective, challenging traditional notions of depth and representation. In effect, Van Gogh invites us to reconsider the boundaries between observation, interpretation, and expression. The garden, then, becomes a site for exploring the very nature of perception.