One of Vincent Van Gogh's last paintings was unveiled at the national gallery of art in Washington on Friday after being hidden for nearly 50 years at a Virginia estate, ABC News reported.
Van Gogh's 1890 painting "Green Wheat Fields, Auvers" was donated to the museum earlier this year by Rachel Mellon, wife of late millionaire Paul, ABC reported. The oil painting had been kept in Paul and Rachel's home in Upperville, Va., since 1955.
The painting depicts the scenery of northern France in a variation of greens and blues.
"It's really one of the great landscapes of that moment. It is in very good condition,'' Mary Morton, curator of French paintings at the museum, told the Associated Press. "This is why we love him so much.''
The 2.5 by 3 feet painting, which had previously been unframed now lives in a gold frame, with no protective glass, next to a self-portrait of the artist.
According to the AP, the "Green Wheat Fields, Auvers" was created while the painter was struggling. Nearly two years before he created the oil painting, Van Gogh has cut his earlobe off and committed himself to an asylum in southern France. A few months late he returned to northern France and produced the landscape painting.
According to ABC News the bright green and blue colors used in the "Green Wheat Fields, Auvers" painting are interesting "considering that the end of van Gogh's life is understood to be extremely sad and bleak."
"What's great about this picture is that it really is just a field painting. It's just about grass and wind and sky," Morton said. "It's very sort of pure in that sense. There's no story. There are no figures. There's nothing to read. It's just this feeling he has while he's out there, and he's completely absorbed by the environment.''
The AP said it is likely that the painting was completed in June or July of 1890, just weeks before his death in late July.
"He suffered but was soothed by nature," Morton said in an interview with ABC News. "He's struggling, but he is feeling these incredible waves of joy."
