Words of Note

My dear Theo,

At last I can send you a little sketch ... a new idea in my head.... This time it's just simply my bedroom, only here color is to do everything, and giving by its simplification a grander style to things, is to be suggestive here of rest....

The walls are pale violet. The floor is of red tiles.

The wood of the bed and chairs is the yellow of fresh butter, the sheets and pillows very light greenish-citron.

The coverlet scarlet. The window green.

The toilet table orange, the basin blue.

The doors lilac.

And that is all - there is nothing in this room with its closed shutters.

The broad lines of the furniture again must express inviolable rest.

* An excerpt from a letter to the artist's brother, Theo, in 1888.