• <em>Van Gogh - poems by John Caselberg </em>, 1957
  • <em>Van Gogh - poems by John Caselberg </em>, 1957
  • <em>Van Gogh - poems by John Caselberg </em>, 1957
  • <em>Van Gogh - poems by John Caselberg </em>, 1957
  • <em>Van Gogh - poems by John Caselberg </em>, 1957

Van Gogh - poems by John Caselberg , 1957

Record number
cm001352
Title

Van Gogh - poems by John Caselberg

Date
1957
Medium
lithographs
Support
5 sheets of paper
Dimensions
1: 326 x 226 mm
2: 357 x 251 mm
3: 355 x 251 mm
4: 356 x 251 mm
5: 356 x 251 mm
Inscriptions

1: VAN GOGH / Poems by / JOHN CASELBERG / Lithographs by / COLIN MCCAHON. (in plate)
2: VAN / GOGH / POEMS / BY / JOHN / CASELBERG (in plate, u.r.-c.r.); lithographs by / Colin McCahon (in plate, b.l.); Auckland / Sept. 1957 (in plate, b.r.)

Extended inscriptions

3: one
Wild the hedgerows, wild the spring,
Wild the yellowhammers sing,
Wild the roaring of the sea;
Wilder still the blood in me.

Two
I was taken by the palms and led
To where the lonely moon's white light bled
Through an abyss in the sky:
yearning there in agony
For me.

Three
God, it is all dark.
The heart beat but there is no anwer-
-ing hark
Of a hearer and no one to speak.

4: four
Six years I have wrestled
With a bare branch,
Sought sap in an old tree.
Heard a shrill chaffinch
Cry out occasionally
From a black bough,
Seen her hair and her features
And her turned away brow.

5: five
Seven dumb beasts of burden
Walked across my garden.
One was Envy, one was Hate
- Pity, Love, and Self-conceit
Pride was there - Humility.
All were beasts and all were me.

Exhibition history

1980 Colin McCahon
Robert McDougall Art Gallery
Christchurch
22/8/1980 - 19/10/1980

1983 Colin McCahon: The Mystical Landscape
National Art Gallery
Wellington
12/12/1983 - 21/1/1984

2001 Answering Hark: Caselberg/McCahon: Poet/Painter
Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki
Auckland
17/3/2001 - 20/5/2001

2005 From Alpha to Beata
Forrester Gallery
Oamaru
21/9/2005 - 13/11/2005

2006 Colin McCahon: from the collection
Forrester Gallery
Oamaru
2006 -

2015 McCahon/Van der Velden
Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetu
Christchurch
18/12/2015 - 10/9/2016

2016 Colin McCahon: from the collection
Forrester Gallery
Oamaru
15/10/2016 - 11/12/2016

Notes

John Caselberg's 'Van Gogh' sequence of poems appeared in The Sound of Morning (Pegasus, 1954).