About Wheat Field with Cypresses
Vincent van Gogh painted Wheat Field with Cypresses in the summer of 1889, in the countryside around the asylum at Saint-Rémy-de-Provence where he was then living. Cypress trees fascinated him: he wrote to his brother Theo that they were as beautiful in line and proportion as an Egyptian obelisk, and that he was surprised no one had painted them the way he saw them.
The composition is built in bands. Ripe yellow wheat bends in the wind across the front, a dark mass of cypresses rises on the right, green olive trees and blue hills fill the middle, and above them white and blue clouds curl through the sky. Everything moves, painted in thick, rhythmic strokes.
Van Gogh thought highly enough of the subject to paint it again. This version, painted outdoors, belongs to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York; a later studio version is in the National Gallery in London.
Tips for this puzzle
Each band of the picture has its own color, so sort the pieces by band first: yellow wheat, green trees, blue hills, swirling sky. The dark cypresses are the quickest part to assemble.
Vincent van Gogh, Wheat Field with Cypresses, 1889. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Public domain (CC0); image: www.metmuseum.org. Image source. All image credits
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How to play
- Pick 12 to 150 pieces (up to 48 on a phone). Each piece count keeps its own puzzle, so you can switch and come back.
- Drag a piece into the frame. Drop it close to where it belongs and it clicks into place and stays there.
- Outside the frame, drop a piece next to one it fits and they join. A joined group moves as one, and clicks into the frame as one.
- Preview shows the whole painting faintly in the frame. Edges only hides every piece without a straight edge, so you can do the border first.
- Tidy lines up the loose pieces beside the frame, edge pieces first. Press it again to scatter them.
- The clock starts with your first move and stops while you’re paused or in another tab. There’s no time limit.
- Your puzzle is saved in this browser as you go. Leave and come back to carry on where you left off.
Keyboard
Press Tab to go from piece to piece. The arrow keys move the piece one place at a time, lined up with the places in the frame, and Enter or Space drops it.
A jigsaw is a puzzle about seeing shapes and colors, so there’s no way to play it with a screen reader. We’re sorry about that.
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