The portrait is known as ‘The Lover’ because Van Gogh wrote in a letter to Theo: ‘He’s good-looking, very jaunty, very easy-going in his appearance, and he’d suit me down to the ground for a painting of lovers.’Van Gogh had a difficult relationship with women and admired the lieutenant for his amorous conquests. With a little self-mockery, he wrote to Theo: ‘Milliet is lucky, he has all the Arlésiennes he wants, but there you are, he can’t paint them, and if he were a painter he wouldn’t have any.’
Press A for information about Van Gogh’s painting technique, or press B for information about the painting’s title.