Vincent van Gogh’s crude speculations, written to Émile Bernard from Arles in August 1888, would have appalled the intensely private fifty-four-year-old Edgar Degas, who had recently started selling his work through Vincent’s brother, Theo, a director at Boussod, Valadon & Cie. (Degas’s own collection, formed during the 1890s, would include two glorious still lifes and an early drawing by Vincent.)
