It takes an artist, a motivated painter, a passionate photographer, to capture the beauty of the olive tree. The stunning, powerful image of the olive tree with its silver green leaves, is only portrayed by the deep passion of the artist.
Ancient Greek vases portray olive tree images and impressionist painters express their admiration of the olive tree with their brushes and imagination. The painting of the dove with the olive branch by Picasso is the symbol of peace internationally.
The many centuries old trees, with their beautiful green color, are the symbol of the Southern Greece’s landscape, which gives the spectator the feeling of power and strength, also relaxation and rest.
Traveling around Peloponnese and Crete, seeing the thousands of the old olive trees, you get to feel the presence of the Greek gods and goddesses, a feeling that takes you to a wonderful, mystical world.
Vincent Van Gogh painted a number of pictures of the olive tree. In his painting of olive pickers, he displays the relationship between man and nature. It shows men interacting with nature, are able to connect with the divine.
Although when Van Gogh made the paintings of the olive tree and the pickers, he was going through illness, emotional turmoil and entered voluntarily an asylum. These significant pictures are considered the best of his work.
His olive tree paintings expressed a connection between painter and nature. The painter uses his heart and emotions, more than his paint and paintbrush, to bring out the beauty that goes beyond the portrayal of the olive trees. He shows the trees with the emotions that inspired him through his unique style and imagination.
The agricultural village of Horta de Sant Joan of Spain, with the characteristic landscape, is the birthplace of Manuel Pallares, who was a good friend of Pablo Picasso. Picasso visited his friend and during his staying in the village he said that, “Everything I know I learn in Horta”.
The village has a historical value, because two very important components met there, an old olive tree and a painter, ending in the painter’s development of his artistic capture of nature. His passion got stronger as he saw a 2,000 year old tree, which inspired him with his new style.
In the living room of Picasso’s house, always was present his favorite painting, by his friend Manuel Pallares. The painting with the 2,000 year old tree, the nature’s art, he fell in love with, -in Horta de Sant Joan,- some years ago.