Les Arenes

About 200m up the road from our apartment is a large white sports stadium known as the Arles Amphitheatre. It is used regularly for bullfights, concerts and other events and seats about 20,000 people, similar to North Harbour Stadium. Unlike the latter though, it appears in a painting by Vincent van Gogh.

At the time he painted Les Arenes (Nov/Dec 1888), he had his mate Paul (Gauguin) staying with him. Gauguin was escaping the winter chill in Paris – he seemed to like the warmer climes, and eventually fled to the Pacific to paint naked Polynesian maidens. As they huddled around the fireplace at the Yellow House, he must have said to van Gogh, “Hey Vince, ever been to a bullfight?” Hearing that, van Gogh would have leapt up and said, “Yeah, man, last spring. That gives me an idea for a painting” before disappeared off to find his favourite smock and brushes. Maybe the memory of the bullfight started to get to him – the matador winning victory over the bull and then cutting its ear off as a trophy – or maybe it was just an attempt to get Gauguin arrested after he threatened van Gogh with a razor, but a few weeks later he cut his own earlobe off and gave it to a prostitute.

Anyway, back to the stadium. It was built around the first century BC after Julius Caesar established the city as a sort of retirement village for the Roman 5th Legion. When you wander around ancient monuments, it’s easy to imagine them lying in ruin for centuries until the council builds a visitor centre and some interpretive displays, but this is not the case.

After the fall of the Roman Empire it became prime real estate. Solid construction, arched windows and plenty of natural light, not like your typical medieval leaky building. They built stuff properly in those days. About 200 houses and two churches were built inside the stadium. It wasn’t until the 1800’s that they began booting out the remaining residents and declaring it a national monument. And holding bullfights. And hence a visit by a scruffy drunkard in paint stained pants.