Arles, Roman and Romanesque Monuments

Arles: The City Where Van Gogh Painted 300 Works in Fifteen Months and Then Cut Off His Ear

Van Gogh arrived in Arles in February 1888 and left in May 1889, involuntarily. In the intervening fifteen months, despite the breakdown that led to the famous December ear incident and his voluntary admission to a psychiatric facility in nearby Saint-Rémy, he produced over 300 paintings and drawings. The Arles light, which is genuinely unusual – intensely bright, with a quality that made Provence the destination for painters a generation before the Impressionists arrived – runs through all of them. None of those paintings are in Arles now. They were sold or given away during Van Gogh’s lifetime. The Fondation Vincent van Gogh at 35 Rue du Docteur Fanton hosts changing exhibitions and interpretive work connected to the period; it is worth a visit, but don’t go expecting Van Gogh originals.

The Roman Amphitheatre

Built around 90 AD with a capacity of 20,000, the Arènes d’Arles is a UNESCO World Heritage monument and one of the best-preserved Roman amphitheatres in France. Unlike the Colosseum, it continued to be used in every century since the Romans built it: as a fortress, as a residential neighbourhood (500 people lived inside its walls until the 19th century), and now for bullfights and bull-racing events during the Easter and September Ferias. The Feria is the best time to see it in full use; the atmosphere is specific to Arles and nothing like tourism.

You can walk in during quieter periods and climb the medieval towers that were added to the structure during its fortress phase. The visual effect of standing inside an intact Roman arena and looking up at medieval stonework laid on top of ancient arches is peculiar and rewarding.

Église Saint-Trophime and Les Alyscamps

Saint-Trophime on the Place de la République is the main Romanesque monument and gives Arles its UNESCO dual-heritage status. The 12th-century portal is the finest Romanesque sculpture in Provence: an extraordinary Last Judgement tympanum with carved saints and figures of extraordinary precision for the period. The cloister behind the church is calm and cooler than the main square.

Les Alyscamps, the Roman and early Christian necropolis at the edge of the old town, is where Van Gogh and Paul Gauguin painted together in the autumn of 1888 – the period just before everything fell apart between them. The avenue of sarcophagi lined by poplar trees looks much as it did then. It is genuinely moving as a place and not particularly crowded.

The Photography Festival

Les Rencontres d’Arles, the international photography festival, runs from July through early October each year; the 2026 edition runs July 6 to October 4. The festival takes over the Roman theatre, church buildings, and temporary venues throughout the city with exhibitions of contemporary and historical photography. The city fills during the opening week in July; it is quieter in August and September but the exhibitions remain. This is the best possible context for visiting Arles.

Food and Getting There

The Saturday morning market fills the boulevards around the central area with Provençal produce, olives, herbs, and local food. For eating: the Café Van Gogh on the Place du Forum occupies the location immortalised in Café Terrace at Night (1888) and has a menu that ranges from reasonable to tourist-priced depending on what you order.

Arles is on the main TGV line via a short TER connection; Avignon is 20 minutes by train. Two days is the minimum to cover the Roman sites, the Romanesque church, the Van Gogh locations, and the Camargue marshland region to the south, which has white horses, black bulls, and pink flamingoes in a landscape unlike anywhere else in France.