Almost 125 years ago, after bouts of self-mutilation and hospitalization, Vincent van Gogh announced to his brother Theo his plans to embark on a series of floral paintings. The iconic Post-Impressionist painter completed almost 130 of these works in this last phase of life. But following his death, the depictions of wildly spinning flora, left behind at the Saint-Rémy asylum where van Gogh was living, were eventually split up.

This May, the Metropolitan Museum of Art will exhibit four of the riveting depictions, side by side, for the very first time. The show, titled "Van Gogh: Irises and Roses," will feature just what it states.