Potato Eaters

Vincent van Gogh

National Gallery of Art

This is a grayscale print that shows a group of five people sitting around a table, sharing a meal under a solitary hanging lamp. The women wear dark dresses with white cloth bonnets, while the men wear dark jackets and pants with gray caps. The people all have light skin and pronounced cheekbones, and they look at the table or at each other with solemn expressions. The person closest to us has their back to us, and they are facing the table and partially blocking our view. A woman on the left pours a tea kettle into something at the center of the table that we can't see. There appears to be a large plate on the table with steam rising from it. Some of the people point toward the plate. The room around them is gray, with some indistinct objects hung on the walls.