Van Gogh painted ‘the starry night’ on a July morning

South Korean researchers determined Vincent van Gogh likely observed the sky for his painting The Starry Night on the morning of July 22, 1889.

The team studied the positions of the Moon, Venus, and stars in the painting, comparing them to historical weather records near the Saint-Rémy asylum in southern France, where Van Gogh was a patient. Their analysis revealed the artist likely painted the scene during the early hours of the morning, not in June as previously believed.

The findings appear in Scientific Reports.