Through the thick brush strokes and swatched fields of this later Vincent Van Gogh painting one can make out a row of dwellings built into the hillside. van Gogh painted this scene from Chaponoval, an agricultural village outside of Auvers sur Oise, France. In the 1890s when this painting was created, Chaponoval remained relatively untouched by the Industrial Revolution raving elsewhere in France and Europe. The cottages depicted here convey a snapshot of this way of life maintained in the building technique using sandstone and heavily thatched roofs. A figure can be spotted on the roof, perhaps repairing the thatching, with their ladder projecting into the sky. Two other boldly outlined figures emerge in the lower left-hand corner from the outlines of the houses behind them. They are nearly indistinguishable from their surroundings, a suggestion of their socio-economic position in France at the time they were painted (-www.vincentvangough.org). van Gogh rendered the composition with a cool palette dominated by black outlining and balances the dark weightiness of the farmhouses with an airy blue sky.