Vincent had barely settled into his new studio in Nuenen or Anthon van Rappard came to visit for ten days. Together they set out to paint.
At the end of May Vincent reported to Theo: "We have made as many trips together as you can imagine to the weavers and all kinds of beautiful cases outside - he was very pleased with the nature here, which is beginning to please me more and more. Some of those beautiful cases must be the water mills in the area that they watch together. After Van Rappard left Nuenen, Vincent wrote to him: "Since your departure I have been working on a watermill - the one I asked about in that inn at the station [...] It is the same as the two other watermills that we visited together but with two red roofs and that one can see right in front - with poplars around it. Will be superb in autumn.
The painter describes the Collse watermill south of the village of Nuenen, below the Eeneind station; it is literally on the border of Nuenen and Tongelre. The water mill with the typical red roofs is located on the Kleine Dommel stream. The mill is mentioned as early as the early fourteenth century as acquired property of Lord Otto van Cuijk. During Vincent's visit, the water mill was owned by Wouter Martinus Smulders. He paints the mill in operation: the right wheel forms a stream of water in the pond. Without a human figure, he nevertheless depicts labor.
The base of the present mill dates from the late eighteenth century. In addition to grinding corn in the right-hand building, oil was struck in the nineteenth century. By Vincent's time this no longer seems to be the case; he paints sludge on the paddles of the wheel. Of the two wheels as seen by Vincent, the wheel of the oil mill on the left was removed in the early twentieth century. In 1998 the wheel was reinstalled and five years later oil was again struck; the mill was also restored.
The painting Water Mill is in the Noordbrabants Museum in 's-Hertogenbosch. The other mills Vincent visited with Van Rappard were the Opwetten watermill and the Hooidonk mill in Nederwetten.
The Collse Water Mill is open to the public every Saturday morning, excluding holidays.
