Good Samaritan by Vincent van Gogh - Early May 1890 - 73 × 59.5 cm Kröller-Müller Museum Good Samaritan by Vincent van Gogh - Early May 1890 - 73 × 59.5 cm Kröller-Müller Museum

Good Samaritan

oil on canvas • 73 × 59.5 cm
  • Vincent van Gogh - March 30, 1853 - July 29, 1890 Vincent van Gogh Early May 1890

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When van Gogh was painting this piece, he was staying in an institution for the mentally ill. It is a mirrored copy of Eugène Delacroix's Good Samaritan. Van Gogh also made a copy of Delacroix's Pietà. 

The painting shows a classic Biblical story. The man from Samaria pushes the robbed man onto his horse. In the background two men can be seen, a priest and a man from the important house of Levi, who let the wounded man lay on the road as they passed him by. Only the Samaritan helped the wounded man.