In which French town did Van Gogh paint The Starry Night while in an asylum? The answer is Saint-Rémy.
Van Gogh painted The Starry Night in 1889 while he was a patient at Saint-Paul-de-Mausole, an asylum just outside Saint-Rémy-de-Provence in southern France. He entered the institution voluntarily on 8 May 1889, after the crisis that followed his troubled period living with Paul Gauguin in Arles.
The painting draws on the view from his room, including the surrounding hills and cypress trees, but it is not a literal record of what he saw. Van Gogh painted the scene during daylight and relied on memory, imagination, and earlier studies to create its swirling night sky and stylized village.
Saint-Rémy is often confused with Arles, where Van Gogh produced many celebrated works, including paintings of the Yellow House and sunflowers. It is also distinct from Auvers-sur-Oise, where he moved in May 1890 and spent the final months of his life. During roughly a year in Saint-Rémy, he created around 150 canvases, including The Irises and numerous paintings of olive groves and wheat fields.