In 1888, Vincent van Gogh had enough of the depressing, cold winter in Paris and moved to Arles to get out of his funk. Only it turned out it wasn’t so sunny in Arles, either.

Not so luckily for van Gogh, the winter of 1888 was Arles’s coldest winter in almost thirty years. When he got off his train, he saw a world covered in snow and probably wished he had bought ticket insurance. Still, being van Gogh, I’m sure he had a nice cry about it and then told himself he better start painting anyway. Landscape with Snow showcases his first impressions of the region, but, rest assured, he stayed long enough to see that notorious Arles sun too.

Van Gogh’s move to Arles was not entirely motivated by Paris bumming him out (though that was a pretty big factor). An avid fan of Japanese woodblock prints, van Gogh believed Arles would be the right kind of environment to inspire in his work a similar Oriental aesthetic. He believed the sun would wash out details and simplify forms into intense but basic colors and shapes. Provence, the region of France containing Arles, was, according to van Gogh, the “Japan of the South.” We’ll let him have that one because, sure, why not?

It is true that many artists were influenced by the vivid graphic qualities of Japanese art, including Degas, Cassatt, Monet, and Lautrec. Van Gogh had hoped to attract like-minded painters to Arles to start his own Japanese Woodblock Fan Club, but only Gauguin showed up. As you may know, they didn’t end up getting along too well.

Fun fact: Donald Trump requested Landscape with Snow be hung in the White House (it is not uncommon for presidents to borrow major works of art to decorate the Oval Office). The Guggenheim politely declined his request, offering instead to loan him Maurizio Cattelan’s America, an 18-Karat, fully functioning, solid gold toilet. Much more appropriate, if you ask me.