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Art and music combine in this charming music box. The outer paper box features a detail from one of the J. Paul Getty Museum's most popular paintings, Vincent van Gogh's Irises. Inside, a high-quality sound mechanism is mounted on a resonance board for sound quality. The melody "Für Elise" by Ludwig van Beethoven plays when the hand crank is turned.

- Box dimensions: 2.25 inches x 1.75 x 1.25 inches
- Made in China
- Item #: GMB01

A severe mental health crisis, in which he cut off his own ear, prompted Van Gogh to admit himself to the Saint-Paul Asylum at Saint-Rémy in the south of France. His recuperation began with paintings of the asylum garden, Irises chief among them. The close study of nature was the foundation of Van Gogh's art, as his precise delineation of individual flowers suggests, but he also brought to that study an astonishing degree of subjective intensity. We feel this in the painting's strong colors, thickly applied paint, and powerful decorative rhythms, all of which convey the artist's sense of nature's surging vitality.

Vincent van Gogh
Irises
Dutch, Saint-Rémy, France, 1889
Oil on canvas
28" x 36 5/8"
90.PA.20

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