During the winter of 1884–85, while living in Nuenen, Van Gogh painted more than forty studies of peasant heads, culminating in his first multifigured, large-scale composition, The Potato Eaters. The painting portrays a peasant family at mealtime, expressing their connection to the earth through the same hands they use for eating. It is characterized by a dark palette and coarse application of paint, typical of Van Gogh's Nuenen period.