Van Gogh a Paris Reperages (1988)

What is a spotting? Maybe that’s it: hanging out in a bistro ... letting your thoughts flow. ”In this evocation of Van Gogh in Paris, André S. Labarthe’s thoughts go first to a reproduction of a painting, very old shoes, terrible“ grolles “in cowhide, painted by Van Gogh, and a reproduction showing the feet of Christ, detail of a painting by Grünewald painted in the 16th century. André S. Labarthe also remembers that Alain Resnais had broken into the apartment of the Van Gogh brothers on rue Lepic. There was this pair of shoes there ... He thinks of Antonin Artaud, who saw in a portrait of Van Gogh by himself “this figure of a red butcher, who inspects us and spies on us, who scrutinizes us with one eye. Torve too “. In this film where the thoughts of André S. Labarthe take shape, places were filmed: those visited by Van Gogh and his friends in Montmartre, the Van Gogh museum in Amsterdam. In this space which “looks like an airport“, the filmmaker imagines an incredible meeting: that of Vincent Van Gogh and Antonin Artaud. Alain Cuny’s voice reads extracts from Artaud’s texts on Van Gogh: the evidence of their fraternity of spirit is obvious to us.