MichaelScott

The most famous sky in art history now has a date: July 22, 1889. For decades everyone said June. Van Gogh wrote to Theo around June 18 that he’d finished a new study of a starry sky, and an earlier reading matched it to June 19 and called the swirling stars Aries. A Korean team thinks that’s the wrong constellation. Shape analysis matched the five central stars to the Hyades in Taurus, and his later pen drawing fits even better. Around July 22, the Hyades rose in the east beside Venus, with a moon close to the crescent on the canvas. Weather records suggest the sky was clear enough to see it. He may have dreamed it up in June and finished after July 22.