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VINCENT VAN GOGH: A LIFE
FROM BEGINNING TO END
(BIOGRAPHIES OF PAINTERS)
by HOURLY HISTORY.
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Having read Lust For Life, his biography by Irving Stone in a novel form, decades ago, the character was forever remembered as one in an agony of a lonely existence. Seeing his works, later, in various museums across the world, and reproductions too of others, the artist kept coming through, vibrant and yet elusive.
This biography, again, brings him alive, vividly.
It's as if his soul - or at least his Vital body - isn't at rest but still in that agony of creation unfinished, and is invoked via his mention or that of his works.
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"“When I have a terrible need of—shall I say the word—religion. Then I go out and paint the stars.”
"—Vincent van Gogh"
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"Theo visited van Gogh often and reacted positively to his new paintings, assuring him that he had a unique talent. Yet Theo’s appraisal of his brother’s experimentation at Saint-Paul was not without criticism. One painting in particular, The Starry Night (1889), was not to Theo’s taste. Completed around June 1889, The Starry Night is now one of the most recognizable works of art in the world and depicts the east-facing view from van Gogh’s bedroom window at Saint Paul. He painted this view dozens of times under different weather conditions but The Starry Night is the only view painted at night. Theo’s criticism of The Starry Night was that it did not seem very spontaneous. He said, “the search for some style is prejudicial to the true sentiment of things.”"
It's funny, they didn't see what seems so obvious now - the turmoil of the very heart and soul of the artist seeking to escape into the constant motion of the heavens, of the galaxies, the very universe. ................................................................................................
"“Someone has a great fire in his soul and nobody ever comes to warm themselves at it, and passers-by see nothing but a little smoke at the top of the chimney and then go on their way.”
"—Vincent van Gogh"
Most renowned writers couldn't have expressed him better. Why, most couldn't have done even so well, so precisely.
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Author mentions at separate times, two of works of the artist’s as being now in Pushkin Museum in Moscow. Since they were originally owned by French owners, one can only infer that their arrival since then in Moscow was via nazi theft during WWII.
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"“The sadness will last forever.”
"—Vincent van Gogh’s last words"
It wouldn't, had he been born in a free culture unlike that of abrahmic societies.
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"In January 1890, an article by critic Albert Aurier entitled “Unknown Painters: Vincent Van Gogh” was published in Mercure de France. Aurier was captivated by van Gogh’s work, impressed by its originality and power. Aurier’s words were so intensely praising that the article actually caused van Gogh to doubt himself. He wrote to Aurier and suggested that his insistence that, “he [Vincent] is the only painter that perceived the chromatism of objects with this intensity,” was better directed at Monticelli.
"Aurier’s article was published at a fortuitous time for van Gogh as his work was causing a stir at the exhibition of Les XX in Brussels. Van Gogh also sold one of his paintings at this show, the very first time he had made a sale. A painter named Anna Bloch bought the piece La Vigne Rouge (1888), which now resides at the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow. Van Gogh’s work was also shown at the Independent Artistes exhibition in Paris around this time, and this selection of paintings led Claude Monet to name van Gogh the best artist in the show. In a healthy person, this newfound success might have had an invigorating effect, but for van Gogh, it caused a serious relapse. He experienced a severe depression that lasted for two months."
Monet praised him, that's high praise indeed!
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"There was one joyful occasion in van Gogh’s life during this dark period. In April 1889, Theo married Johanna Bonger, a teacher he had met in Amsterdam. Theo and Johanna had a son on January 31, 1890, who they named Vincent Willem after the boy’s uncle. Van Gogh reacted to this happy news by painting a new work for young Vincent’s nursery. He painted branches of an almond tree in bloom on a blue background and named it Almond Blossom (1889) to celebrate the birth of his nephew. Trees in the first blossom of the spring held an important significance to van Gogh as symbols of hope and awakening, and he went on to paint a whole series of blossoming trees."
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"Anna van Gogh was a disciplinarian, and Vincent later described his childhood as claustrophobic. Yet, when Vincent was given the opportunity to escape the van Gogh household in 1864 by joining a boarding school in Zevenbergen, he rebelled and begged his parents to bring him home. Instead, they sent Vincent, now aged 13, to a middle school closer to home in Tilburg. At Tilburg, the artist Constant Cornelius Huijsmans taught Vincent to capture the overall impression of objects rather than worrying too much about technique. Although Vincent’s interest was piqued, he was unhappy at Tilburg and dropped out before completing his studies."
It's unclear why, increasingly, the word 'completing' has come to replace the good English one of yore, 'finishing', in this context. But it certainly does not make it better.
Especially when, as they do in film journalism in India, write about a film star having 'completed' education and it amounts to stopping short of beginning a college degree, it merely shows show little the person and family - not to mention the said journalist using the word 'completed' rather than 'finished' - thought of possibility of any further development of mind and consciousness of the person.
As for Vincent van Gogh, he certainly could have gone further, judging by his quote above. It only needed a better opportunity.
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"Vincent Willem van Gogh is one of the most famous painters of all time. A solitary figure living in poverty, destroying himself to create the artworks that would not be appreciated until long after his death, van Gogh is the archetype of an artist. In van Gogh, the notion that a true artist must suffer for his art and that only the vulnerable can channel pure creativity takes form.
"But van Gogh’s life story paints a different picture to the simple sketch of a starving man contemplating suicide that we’ve come to recognize. The desperate act he committed in 1889 when he severed his ear with a razor does not define him. Van Gogh’s life story is as complicated and as full of joy and sorrow as any other.
"As a young man, van Gogh was convinced that he had experienced a religious calling and pursued a career in the church. But he was not a priest, he was an artist, and as soon as he realized this he took to his artistic training with the same fanaticism he had once channeled into studying the Bible."
That explains much.
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"In just ten years van Gogh painted more than 850 oil paintings and 1,300 drawings, watercolors, and studies. In the last few years of his life when his mental health was at its very worst, van Gogh’s productivity reached its peak, and he created some of his most accomplished and popular works. During a spell at the Saint-Remy asylum, van Gogh painted The Starry Night—one of the most recognizable paintings in the world—out of his bedroom window. And during an ill-fated collaboration with the artist Paul Gauguin that led to the incident with the razor, Vincent painted Bedroom in Arles and Gauguin’s Chair.
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"Van Gogh lived through debilitating mental illness and poverty, but his life was not lived in vain. While his last days were marred by isolation, he did not live or work in solitude and was very much a part of the European art scene. Van Gogh operated on the fringes of the Neo-Impressionist and Symbolist movements, ensuring his uniqueness but also making his work difficult to sell. It’s a cruel twist that van Gogh died by his own hand in abject poverty while today his paintings are some of the most valuable in the world."
Certainly, his name is probably the most well known.
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"“Someone has a great fire in his soul and nobody ever comes to warm themselves at it, and passers-by see nothing but a little smoke at the top of the chimney and then go on their way.”
"—Vincent van Gogh"
Most renowned writers couldn't have expressed him better. Why, most couldn't have done even so well, so precisely.
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"Vincent Willem van Gogh opened his eyes to the world on March 30, 1853, in the village of Groot Zundert in Brabant, the Netherlands. The future artist was born into a prosperous upper-middle-class family and was the sixth and eldest son of Protestant minister Theodorus van Gogh and his wife, Anna Carbentus. As you would assume, the van Goghs were a religious family and their parenting was strict. A governess educated young Vincent at home with his siblings until it was time for him to join the Zundert village school at age seven."
That ought to read "sixth child and eldest son".
"Vincent is often described as a serious child, an outsider, and a possible genius. These descriptors fit neatly into our perceptions of him as an adult, but it’s hard to say whether his early years were happy or not. As a very young child, Vincent was already developing a love for drawing. The van Gogh family also took long walks together in the countryside surrounding Zundert, instilling in him a deep connection to nature that he would spend much of his adult life trying to capture in oil paint.
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"Anna van Gogh was a disciplinarian, and Vincent later described his childhood as claustrophobic. Yet, when Vincent was given the opportunity to escape the van Gogh household in 1864 by joining a boarding school in Zevenbergen, he rebelled and begged his parents to bring him home. Instead, they sent Vincent, now aged 13, to a middle school closer to home in Tilburg. At Tilburg, the artist Constant Cornelius Huijsmans taught Vincent to capture the overall impression of objects rather than worrying too much about technique. Although Vincent’s interest was piqued, he was unhappy at Tilburg and dropped out before completing his studies."
It's unclear why, increasingly, the word 'completing' has come to replace the good English one of yore, 'finishing', in this context. But it certainly does not make it better.
Especially when, as they do in film journalism in India, write about a film star having 'completed' education and it amounts to stopping short of beginning a college degree, it merely shows show little the person and family - not to mention the said journalist using the word 'completed' rather than 'finished' - thought of possibility of any further development of mind and consciousness of the person.
As for Vincent van Gogh, he certainly could have gone further, judging by his quote above. It only needed a better opportunity.
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"At age 16, van Gogh entered the workplace. In his letters—the most valuable primary source of the artist’s life—he describes his childhood home life as “austere and cold, and sterile.” He was happy to leave it behind. Van Gogh’s first job was at The Hague, working as an apprentice at the Dutch arm of Parisian art dealer Goupil & Cie. He landed the job thanks to the influence of his uncle Cent, who also worked with Goupil & Cie.
"Goupil & Cie dealt primarily in nineteenth-century French and Dutch paintings, and while van Gogh was completing his training, he was surrounded by etchings, paintings, and drawings by the most contemporary artists of the day. He became enamored with works by artists who collectively became known as “School of The Hague” and was influenced by the work of Josef Israels, Millet, Jacob Mavis, and Anton Mauve. Van Gogh’s younger brother, Theo, followed him into the art dealership business, and in 1873, he also began working for Goupil & Cie. Theo was sent to work in Brussels while Vincent was transferred to the London branch, and the brothers began an intense correspondence that would last until Vincent’s death.
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"Van Gogh thrived in London. Living in lodgings on Hackford Road in Stowell, he enjoyed his work and was making a good salary for a man who was only 20 years old. Yet his happiness was short-lived. Van Gogh experienced his first heartbreak in London when he became infatuated with his landlady’s daughter, Eugenie Loyer. Eugenie was, unbeknownst to anyone, already engaged and she firmly rejected Vincent’s advances. Meanwhile, his interest in the art market waned, and the company’s decision to transfer him to Paris only served to increase his resentment towards the entire art market that turned artists’ passion into cold, hard cash. At the same time, van Gogh was experiencing something akin to a calling. Turning to religion for answers, he either resigned or was dismissed from Goupil & Cie in 1876 and decided to follow his father’s example by entering the church and becoming a minister.
"Van Gogh briefly worked as a supply teacher in Ramsgate and then Middlesex, England before becoming the assistant to a Methodist minister named Jones. Although van Gogh was still in the very earliest stages of his religious education, Jones allowed him to give his first sermon a few months into their arrangement. A text of this sermon survives, and in it, van Gogh uses a painting to illuminate his explanation of life as a pilgrimage.
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"However, when van Gogh returned home to his family, who had since moved from Zundert to Etten, they were so worried about his physical and mental health that they insisted he would not return to England but stay with them instead. Van Gogh killed time for a few months by working in a bookshop in Dordrecht but could not shake the deep unhappiness hanging over him. In an attempt to escape the monotony of his life, he studied the Bible with extreme intensity and completely immersed himself in religious life. His habits became monastic, and he became completely frugal.
"In 1877, van Gogh’s family sent him to live with his uncle, Johannes Stricker, in Amsterdam where he intended to study for the entrance exam to the Department of Theology. Stricker was a respected theologian, and under his care, van Gogh became even more religious. He used most of his spare time to translate the Bible into four different languages and fervently studied the practice of Christian confession. Around this time, van Gogh also began to teach himself to draw. Spending hours wandering the museums of Amsterdam, he began making sketches of what he saw but revealed in letters to Theo that he feared drawing would keep him from his religious work.
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"Van Gogh’s religious conviction was, however, not enough to guarantee him a position in the clergy, and he failed his theology entrance exam to the University of Amsterdam. Next, he moved on to the Preparatory School for Evangelists in Laeken where he also failed his three-month course. It was not van Gogh’s academic abilities that were holding him back but his attitude. At Laeken, it was recorded that van Gogh failed his preparatory course because his “lack of submission” made him unsuitable to continue. Despite these setbacks, he became even more fervent in his idealism and even more committed to the Christian cause.
"In January of 1879, van Gogh was successful in securing a six-month placement as a missionary in a coal-mining district of Borinage in Belgium. The workers at Borinage endured extreme poverty, and in a show of solidarity and support, van Gogh took on a life of abject hardship. He gave his lodgings to a homeless person and slept on the floor of a squalid hut. The Evangelist School of Brussels, who was responsible for sending van Gogh to Borinage, deemed his actions unbecoming of a future priest and dismissed him. Still, Van Gogh stayed in Borinage without pay for several months until finally giving in to his parents and returning to Etten in late 1879. It was during this period that van Gogh’s relationship with his father began to deteriorate. Frustrated with his son’s lack of direction, stubbornness, and seeming sabotage of his religious career, Theodorus even advised that he be committed to the lunatic asylum at Geel. Instead, van Gogh would move out of his parents’ house and eventually make his way back to the coal miners."
Potato Eaters?
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"“Love many things, for therein lies the true strength, and whosoever loves much performs much, and can accomplish much, and what is done in love is done well.”
"—Vincent van Gogh"
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"While living among the miners of Borinage, van Gogh survived the long days and nights by sketching the miners and reading works by Dickens, Hugo, and Shakespeare. Even at the absolute height of his religious fanaticism, van Gogh was still excited by art, and in his letters to Theo, he asked about his favorite painters and wrote at length about his own experimentation. In August 1880, van Gogh lodged with a miner in Cuesmes and again took up his habit of sketching the scenes around him. He was a self-taught artist and had taught himself to draw using a manual titled Drawing Course by Charles Bargue. With Theo’s support, van Gogh decided that now was the time to devote himself entirely to his art, and in late 1880, he relocated to Brussels to study under Dutch artist Willem Roelofs.
"Even though van Gogh proved many times that he did not have the temperament for formal study, he applied to study at the Academie des Beaux-Arts. By November 1880, he was a student once more, and at the academy, he learned human anatomy and the important rules of perspective. Theo dutifully sent van Gogh money to fund his studies and cover his living expenses. This arrangement would continue for the rest of van Gogh’s life. Theo also sent him prints of artists they both admired, including Millet’s “work in the fields” series and works by Daumier, Daubigny, and the engraver Gustave Dore.
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"In April 1881, van Gogh returned to Etten to live with his parents and focus on improving the artistic skill he had learned at the academy. For the rest of that year, he drew the scenes around him, focusing on landscapes and laborers working in the fields. On the advice of his cousin, the successful artist Anton Mauve, van Gogh also began to experiment with charcoal and pastels at this time. Increasingly passionate about his art, van Gogh became obsessed with the idea of becoming a great artist, but as he focused single-mindedly on his art, his personal life unraveled.
"While Vincent was living in Etten, his already rocky relationship with his father took a turn for the worse. As demonstrated in an exchange of letters between Vincent and Theo, Vincent’s distaste for the morality and religious system of the clergy was driving a wedge between father and son. Theo asked, “what the devil made you so childish and so shameless as to embitter Father and Father’s life and render it almost impossible.” Both of their parents were disappointed that their eldest son had chosen to pursue art as a career. Van Gogh’s future, they were convinced, would contain only financial and social ruin.
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"Van Gogh alienated himself further from his family in August 1881 when he made an unsolicited and unwanted proposal to his cousin Kee. Cornelia “Kee” Vos-Stricker was the daughter of Johannes Stricker and so Vincent’s first cousin. He fell deeply in love with recently-widowed Kee, who had an eight-year-old son, but his feelings were not reciprocated. Characteristically, van Gogh refused to take Kee’s no for an answer. Johannes Stricker grew impatient with his persistence, and, in despair, van Gogh held his left hand over a lit lamp, begging, “Let me see her for as long as I can keep my hand in the flame.” Stricker blew out the flame.
"Newly committed to his work, van Gogh moved back to The Hague and began to take instruction from Mauve. He completed his first oil paintings under Mauve’s tutelage, but the relationship between the cousins soon soured, due in part to van Gogh’s unwillingness to submit to Mauve’s methods. Mauve disapproved of van Gogh’s lifestyle and tendency to hire transient people from the streets of The Hague as models. When Mauve discovered that he had begun a love affair with a sex worker named Clasina Hoornik, who went by the name of “Sien,” he cut off all communications.
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"In January 1882, Sien was 29 years old, pregnant and already taking care of a five-year-old daughter. Seemingly desiring a family of his own, van Gogh proposed to Sien, knowing that they would both be completely ostracized from his religious family if they were to marry. He wanted to take care of Sien, emotionally, spiritually, and financially; to this end, he compromised his artistic ambitions to pursue a career as an illustrator. Things began looking up when van Gogh received a commission from his uncle Cornelius, also an art dealer, to sketch 12 pen drawings of The Hague. Additionally, Sien gave birth to a baby boy who she named Willem, on July 2, 1882.
"Again, happiness for van Gogh was incredibly brief. His uncle didn’t like the realistic drawings he had produced of The Hague, and van Gogh made no money from the series. With him unable to support Sien and her two children, Sien may have returned to the prostitution. Life at home became unbearable, and, unable to care for her children, Sien was forced to give her daughter to her mother and her newborn son to her brother. At his father’s insistence, van Gogh abandoned Sien and her children completely in late 1883. Sadly, Sien’s story ended in 1904 when she drowned herself in the River Scheldt."
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"“Personally I am convinced that in the long run one gets better results from painting them in all their coarseness than from introducing a conventional sweetness.”
"—Vincent van Gogh"
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"Vincent fled The Hague and its bad memories when in September 1883 he moved to the northern landscape of Drenthe. Drenthe was fertile ground for painters and landscape artists. Drenthe’s heathlands and moors had inspired Mauve, van Rappard, and Max Liebermann, and Vincent sought similar inspiration in the area and its people. Working exclusively in oils, van Gogh joined a long tradition of Dutch painters and captured the daily lives of Drenthe’s rural laborers.
"In The Hague, van Gogh couldn’t afford to pay for models, but in Drenthe, he couldn’t find willing subjects to pose for him. This struggle, the realities of a harsh northern winter, and the crippling loneliness he felt in Drenthe led him to abandon his new home in a little over two months. Once more, van Gogh returned to his parents’ home, now located in Nuenen, Brabant. This time he stayed for over two years.
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"During these two years in Nuenen between early 1884 and 1886, van Gogh completed hundreds of oil paintings, watercolors, and drawings. The masterpiece of this period was The Potato Eaters (1885). In 1887, van Gogh referred to The Potato Eaters in a letter as “the best thing I have done.” The painting represents a peasant family sitting around a table eating their evening meal. Unlike his contemporaries, Millet and Israels, who lent their peasant subjects an air of romantic dignity, van Gogh attempted to depict his subjects exactly as he saw them. The colors used in The Potato Eaters are somber, earthy, and serve to accentuate the coarseness of the scene depicted. Van Gogh saw this work as his masterpiece and a manifesto of his particular artistic mission: to create a painting that depicted the harshest lives exactly as they were lived.
"Along with The Potato Eaters, van Gogh produced a number of character studies of weavers and their cottages. Similarly dark and earthy, these character studies were in line with van Gogh’s desire to convey the peasants’ way of life with veracity. In a letter to Theo, Vincent says, “Personally I am convinced that in the long run one gets better results from painting them in all their coarseness than from introducing a conventional sweetness.”
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"Van Gogh sent The Potato Eaters and his character studies to his brother, who had managed to get a dealer in Paris interested in the work. In August of 1866, van Gogh’s paintings were publicly exhibited for the first time in the windows of the Leurs dealer in The Hague. The paintings did not sell, and van Gogh complained that there was not enough effort being made on his part to find a buyer. Theo countered that the paintings were simply too dark for the current vogue for bright impressionism.
"As had become a pattern in van Gogh’s life, any small victory in his work was offset by traumatic events in his personal life. He was involved with a local woman named Margot Begemann in August 1885; Vincent and Margot were in love and planned to marry, but both the Begemann and van Gogh families opposed the marriage. When van Gogh relented and agreed that he and Margot would not be married, Margot was distraught and tried to kill herself by taking an overdose of strychnine.
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"Months after this disaster, Vincent’s father died suddenly of a heart attack. The relationship between van Gogh and his father had been strained and combative for years, but his sudden death devastated Vincent. Grieving the loss of a lover and his father, van Gogh found himself publicly shamed when the Catholic curate accused him of having sex with a peasant girl and making her pregnant. The curate banned any citizen of Nuenen from posing for van Gogh, and at that final straw, he fled once more, landing this time in Antwerp.
"In Antwerp, van Gogh entered the next phase in the development of his distinctive style. Having studied color theory according to the French romantic painter Eugene Delacroix during earlier bouts of incessant reading, van Gogh began to experiment with his own palette. In Antwerp, he could see works by great seventeenth-century painters such as Peter Paul Rubens and spent hours admiring the heavy, rich colors in his work.
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"It was also in Antwerp that van Gogh was first exposed to Japanese prints. In the 1850s, Japan had opened its ports to invite an exchange of trade with the west. Japanese art became available in Europe in the form of easily transportable prints, and by the 1860s the influence of what became known as Japanism had infused the work of some of the most significant artists of the day. Van Gogh was not immune to the seductive allure of exotic Japanese culture. He decorated his shabby Antwerp room with Japanese prints and later incorporated elements from them in his own paintings.
"This period in Antwerp nourished van Gogh creatively, but physically, he was a wreck. He spent the money Theo sent him almost exclusively on painting materials and models to the detriment of his health. Living in extreme poverty, van Gogh admitted to Theo in February 1866 that for the last eight months he had eaten just six hot meals. He subsisted by drinking coffee, smoking tobacco, and eating bread, further aggravating his fragile health with bouts of heavy drinking. After this admission to Theo, van Gogh was hospitalized for various health complaints that may have included syphilis.
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"Van Gogh’s lifelong aversion to academia didn’t deter him from enrolling in the Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp. Although he was essentially a self-taught artist, he did not reject traditional teaching methods and used many of the same technical manuals to teach himself as those used in art schools of the time. Van Gogh did, however, make a habit of challenging his tutors. The director of the Academy, Charles Verlat, rowed with van Gogh over his unconventional style, and he also had an infamous run-in with Eugene Siberdt. On being asked to draw the Venus of Milo to specific criteria, van Gogh instead drew the naked, armless torso of a Flemish peasant woman. When Sibert made corrections to the drawing, van Gogh flew into a rage. This altercation led him to quit the Academy of Fine Arts from which he never graduated."
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"“When one sees them for the first time one is bitterly, bitterly disappointed and thinks them slovenly, ugly, badly painted, badly drawn, bad in colour, everything that’s miserable.”
"—Vincent van Gogh on Neo-Impressionists"
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"Van Gogh had already demonstrated his tendency towards fanaticism by overworking himself to the point of illness as a student. In March 1886, he moved to Paris determined to become a successful artist and took his extreme self-discipline with him. Initially, van Gogh moved in with Theo in his apartment on Rue Laval in Montmartre. By June, it was clear that this apartment was too small and the brothers moved into a larger apartment on Rue Lepic.
"In Paris, van Gogh attended painting classes at the studio of Felix Cormon. Cormon was well-known as an academic painter who taught his students how to capture perspective, proportion, light, and shadow without limiting them to rigid and traditional painting forms. Van Gogh thrived under Cormon’s tuition. At Cormon’s studio, he met Henri de Toulouse Lautrec, Louis Anquetin, and Emile Bernard and became part of a circle of like-minded painters for the first time.
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"While van Gogh was working at Cormon’s studio between April and May of 1886, Theo was getting used to his new role as the director of the Paris branch of art dealers Boussod & Valadon. Around this time, Theo introduced his brother to Renoir, Degas, Pissarro, and pointillists Seurat and Signac, all of whom eventually influenced his work. Julien Tanguy’s paint shop first exhibited many of these artists in Paris in 1886. This Neo-Impressionist exhibition generated interest in these new painting styles in France and the rest of Europe, but van Gogh’s opinion on them was largely negative.
"Viewing Impressionist works through the traditional criteria of design, composition, and use of color, van Gogh found much of the work in the exhibition lacking. At this stage in his artistic development, he still preferred conventional depictions of simple rural life, similar to those he had tried to capture amongst the miners of Borinage. Speaking of the Neo-Impressionists in a letter to his sister, Wil, van Gogh said, “when one sees them for the first time one is bitterly, bitterly disappointed and thinks them slovenly, ugly, badly painted, badly drawn, bad in colour, everything that’s miserable.”
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"During his time in Paris, van Gogh painted constantly, capturing cityscapes, still lives, and portraits of his acquaintances in the same muted tones. Then one day, he saw the work of Adolphe Monticelli at the Galerie Delareybarette. Van Gogh was dazzled by Monticelli’s use of color, largely achieved using vivid tints. Under the influence of his new friend Signac, van Gogh finally brightened his palette and experimented with the possibilities of pointillism. Pointillism is a scientific approach to painting where small dots of color are applied close together to give the illusion of a blended hue. Van Gogh captured the cityscape of Montmartre and Asnieres using pointillist techniques and was pleased with the results.
"He also experimented with the Japanese ukiyo-e woodblock prints he had become interested in Antwerp. Thanks to Theo’s support, van Gogh was more financially comfortable in Paris than he had been for some time and was able to collect hundreds of these prints. In 1887, he painted The Courtesan, essentially a copy of an original print that he found on the cover of a magazine. While this painting looks unlike any other of van Gogh’s, it is an example of his ability to reproduce a particular style while adding his own signature to the finished work.
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"Around this time, van Gogh met Gauguin, and the pair struck up a friendship. Gauguin’s approach to painting led later artists to see him as a key figure in the Symbolist movement. Gauguin’s intuitive, fluid use of color was the very opposite of the Pointillist’s approach, and van Gogh found himself torn between these very different approaches.
"In 1887, van Gogh launched his own exhibition, displaying the work of his new friends, including Bernard, Anquetin, and possibly Toulouse-Lautrec at the Restaurant du Chalet on Boulevard de Clichy. To his disappointment, however, no Neo-Impressionists would show their work alongside that of Bernard and Gaugin, and the exhibition was not a great success. Part way through the exhibition, van Gogh fell out with the restaurant owner and withdrew his own paintings from the show. With his Neo-Impressionist and Symbolist friends taking painting in very different directions, van Gogh worked even harder to capture the essence of himself in his work.
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"Less than a year into their co-habiting, Theo complained that he found living with Vincent intolerable. Exactly what Theo found intolerable about his brother is not clear, but it was likely related to his tendency towards overwork, his heavy drinking, and his temperament. Van Gogh struggled to live in large cities for long periods but enjoyed the hive of artistic activity he found there, and so in early 1887, he moved into his own apartment in Ansieres. Ansieres was a quiet suburb in the northwest of Paris with easy access to the city. At the time, Signac also lived in Ansieres, and he and van Gogh became good friends.
"By early 1888, van Gogh had completed hundreds of paintings in Paris that reflected a steady but dramatic evolution of style. His work had grown steadily brighter and showed the beginnings of his signature short-brush strokes. Instead of focusing on the plight of rural workers as he had in works like The Potato Eaters, van Gogh found inspiration in Paris’ cafes, boulevards, and people. Finding the money to pay for models was challenging for him, and during this period, he removed the need for sitters by painting a number of self-portraits.
"However, van Gogh’s work ethic had again become dangerous. In February 1888, burned out both physically and creatively, he decided to leave Paris and head south. In the south of France, he hoped he would find a new, colorful yet relaxing environment that would re-invigorate his work and bring peace to his life. It had worked for Cezanne, who had recently spent time in his birthplace of Aix-en-Provence and Monticelli who had painted his birthplace of Marseilles. So, in February of 1888, van Gogh moved to Arles in Provence."
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"“I am interested in all that really exists; I have neither the desire nor the courage to search for the ideal.”
"—Vincent van Gogh"
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"At first Arles appeared to be the perfect cure for van Gogh, whose unhealthy life in Paris had left him physically wasted. The bright and plentiful colors of the Arles landscape had a positive effect on his creative charge, but the fresh air and solitude did not quash his tendency towards excess. Spending extended periods alone and painting fanatically, van Gogh hardly ate and subsisted mostly on alcohol and tobacco. Physically, he was as much of a wreck in Arles as he had been in Paris.
"Artistically, van Gogh returned to earlier themes, painting local peasants working in the fields, capturing orchards of trees in blossom, and attempting seascapes. The more he painted, the more he loosened up and tried new approaches to brushwork and color, allowing ultramarine and yellow tones to dominate his canvasses. Like many of the artists van Gogh was associated with, he exchanged a few of his best paintings from this time. He sent seven canvasses to Port-Aven in October 1888 in exchange for new paintings by Charles Laval, Bernard, and Gaugin.
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"Van Gogh was delighted with his progress in Arles and noted in letters that he was moving away from Impressionist ways of working and edging closer towards finding his own unique expression. van Gogh’s burgeoning style was guided by emotion, and his efforts were focused on translating that emotion with color. As he explained in a letter to Gauguin, colors became “poetic concepts” to him. Using what he had learned from Japanese prints to simplify the forms in his paintings, van Gogh produced some of his most famous works in Arles.
"But living and working in a constant state of expressive urgency soon caused van Gogh to become emotionally unstable. In a letter to Theo, he said, “you know I’ve always thought it ridiculous for painters to live alone . . . You always lose when you’re isolated.” In an attempt to combat his isolation but also share his progress with others, van Gogh had the idea of establishing an artists’ colony in Arles.
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"Arles, he believed, was the perfect location for a community of artists to thrive. Such a community had been successful in Brittany where Gauguin had established the Port-Aven School. Van Gogh had also seen similar communities work in Barbizon and The Hague. He believed he could invigorate his painting by working with a like-minded group to break new ground through collaboration. Theo was encouraged by his brother’s plan, in part because he hoped company would stabilize Vincent’s mood, and he agreed to sell the group’s works at his dealership in Paris.
"Keen to start making his dream of an artists’ colony a reality, van Gogh rented four rooms in the famous Yellow House on Place Lamartine. Abandoned for months and unfurnished, the house was available at the low price of 15 francs per month. Initially, van Gogh remained living at the Cafe de la Gare, where he was cared for by friends, Joseph and Marie Ginoux, and used the Yellow House as an expansive studio. He envisioned using part of the house as a gallery and invited Gauguin and Bernard to join him in his new venture.
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"Gauguin and Bernard had been making great strides in their own painting and, along with Anquetin, had developed a new style that later became known as Synthesism. Like the French literature of the day, Synthetism was concerned with Symbolism and, unlike Impressionism, championed an intellectual approach to painting. Gaugin and his contemporaries used bold outlines to separate different forms, giving their paintings a flat, abstract effect. Van Gogh admired these painters, particularly Gauguin, and sent invitations to join him at the Yellow House. The weeks passed, but no replies came.
"Theo and Vincent had kept up a close correspondence since Vincent arrived in Arles, and Theo was fully aware that his brother’s mental health was declining. In one letter to Theo, van Gogh revealed that he was “once more reduced to almost a state of madness.” He pointed to what he saw as his double nature, that of a monk and a painter, and said that without these two selves he would surely have been reduced to complete madness long ago. Desperate to have someone watching over him, Theo stepped in to convince Gauguin to join van Gogh in the Yellow House. Theo agreed to exhibit Gaugin’s paintings and pay his travel expenses, an arrangement that pleased Gauguin enough that he arrived at the Yellow House at the end of October 1888.
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"Gauguin did not fall in love with Arles to the extent that van Gogh had. Van Gogh’s fascination with the provincial way of life and remarkable light that charged the Arles landscape left Gauguin cold. Yet van Gogh thrived with his companion, working and theorizing by his side, and did all he could to encourage Gauguin to stay for as long as possible, even heeding to Gauguin’s advice on his painting. For the first time, van Gogh painted from memory without a model in front of him and embraced a looser, dreamier aesthetic that can be most clearly seen in Memory of the Garden at Etten.
"Although respectful of the man he admired, van Gogh did not follow Gauguin’s tutelage for long. He had no taste for the abstract and said in a letter to Theo, “I am interested in all that really exists; I have neither the desire nor the courage to search for the ideal.” His aim was to capture the emotional energy of the reality around him, while Gauguin tried to imagine a different reality altogether. The pair worked reasonably well together for a little over a month during which time van Gogh created some of his best-known works. Van Gogh’s Chair, The Night Café , Bedroom in Arles, Starry Night Over the Rhone, and Still Life: Vase with Twelve Sunflowers were all painted at the Yellow House with the intention that they would adorn the walls of the house’s gallery."
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"“Refrain until after riper reflection on both sides, from speaking ill of our poor little yellow house.”
"—Vincent van Gogh to Paul Gauguin"
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"When Gauguin first arrived in Arles, van Gogh was thrilled to have him and looked forward to a fruitful collaboration between two artists. However, as time passed it became clear that the friendship was doomed to fail. The two men had vastly different ideas on what constituted good painting, a disagreement that could have motivated them both, yet their opposing personalities made living together at the Yellow House volatile.
"As time drew on, van Gogh felt increasingly belittled by Gauguin who was arrogant in his insistence that his technique was the only true way to paint. The pair got into intense arguments that lasted long into the night. Gauguin was unhappy in Arles, but van Gogh was emotionally unstable and terrified of abandonment. The friendly relationship between them disintegrated until it reached a breaking point and their frequent arguments descended into violence.
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"According to Gauguin who wrote about the incident to follow in his memoir, van Gogh became agitated one night in the local café. The night had been completely ordinary, and then without any warning, van Gogh threw a glass of absinthe over Gauguin. A short time later, van Gogh followed Gauguin when he left the house to take a walk. Again, without provocation, van Gogh threatened Gauguin with a razor. It’s possible that van Gogh knew that Gauguin was planning to leave him, and, unable to deal with the emotions that caused, he lost control.
"Gauguin escaped van Gogh and spent the night at a hotel. That night, alone in the Yellow House, van Gogh performed the desperate act for which he is sadly remembered. Using an open razor, he sliced off his own ear. He wrapped the ear in newspaper and set out to a local brothel where he and Gauguin were regular customers. After handing the ear to a woman at the brothel, van Gogh returned to the Yellow House. The woman at the brothel notified the police who went immediately to the Yellow House and found van Gogh, bloody and unconscious, on the floor. The police roused van Gogh and took him to the hospital in Arles.
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"The woman at the brothel sent the ear on to the hospital, but it had been detached too long for the doctors to reattach it. Van Gogh asked for Gauguin frequently as he recovered, but Gauguin refused to see him. After a day or two, Gauguin left Arles for Paris and never saw van Gogh again. Later, van Gogh wrote to Gauguin and humbly asked him to “refrain until after riper reflection on both sides, from speaking ill of our poor little yellow house.” Theo took the first train he could from Paris to Arles to be with his brother. According to Theo, van Gogh showed symptoms of that “most dreadful of illness, of madness, and an attack of fievre chaude.” The doctors told Theo that it was possible that his brother would remain insane, it was too early to tell. Van Gogh himself seemed calm and was fully aware that he had experienced a mental break, as he could remember nothing of the incident itself.
"The hospital discharged the artist after two weeks of care, and he returned to his Yellow House. Van Gogh painted while in the hospital and presented his doctor, Dr. Felix Rey, with a portrait as a thank you for his sympathetic care. Dr. Rey was an intern, only 23 years old at the time he met van Gogh, but genuinely cared about his wellbeing. Rey did not, however, care for van Gogh’s portrait of him and used it for many years to repair a chicken coop. Rey took a particular dislike to van Gogh’s use of the color red in his rendering of his hair and his decision to use green in the wallpapered background. Portrait of Doctor Felix Rey (1888) now belongs to the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts and has an estimated worth of 50 million dollars.
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"When released from the hospital, van Gogh tried to return to his life before the incident and took his easel and painting supplies out into Arles to paint. Aware that his mental health was still precarious and that he could not guarantee that he would not suffer another relapse, van Gogh did not invite Gauguin or any other painters to join him. For now, he returned to solitude.
"Sadly, the local community of Arles did not appreciate van Gogh’s attempt at rehabilitation. The Arles newspaper had run a short report on his self-harm incident causing small-town gossip to spread. The citizens of Arles united and signed a petition to have van Gogh interned. Despite having visited him in the hospital after he maimed himself, friends of Vincent’s, the Ginoux family, also signed the petition. Locals began referring to van Gogh as “le fou roux,” meaning the redheaded madman, and in March 1889, the police closed down the Yellow House. Bitterly disappointed but lacking the strength to fight for his independence, van Gogh voluntarily entered the Saint-Paul-de-Mausole psychiatric hospital in Saint-Rémy."
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"“When I have a terrible need of—shall I say the word—religion. Then I go out and paint the stars.”
"—Vincent van Gogh"
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"Theo did not initially support van Gogh’s decision to commit himself to an asylum. The Saint-Paul-de-Mausole asylum was a former monastery located around 19 miles from Arles that was managed by a former naval doctor, Theophile Peyron. Dr. Peyron severely limited van Gogh’s access to the outside world, something that Theo thought would exacerbate his brother’s depression. Van Gogh wrote to Theo, however, and explained that he was simply unable to live alone and unable move forward with his life. In the asylum, he lived in two rooms with bars on the windows, probably former monk’s quarters, and used one of the rooms as a studio.
"The asylum did not offer van Gogh any specific cure for his mental illness, yet the tranquil surroundings and respite from being responsible for his own wellbeing was an escape of sorts. He accepted that he was unwell but with that acceptance came a sense of fatalism; he did not think he would ever be well again. Dr. Peyron restricted van Gogh’s movements, which in turn restricted the subject matter of his paintings. Under these restrictions, painting became van Gogh’s salvation and the only thing that stopped him from sliding into the same morose apathy he saw in the other asylum inmates.
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"Theo made a special effort to send his brother letters full of news from Paris and special deliveries of magazines and books. Meanwhile, van Gogh painted the asylum and its gardens, producingThe Garden of Saint Paul Hospital (1889), Vestibule of the Asylum (1889), and Saint-Remy (1889) during the first months of his stay. His condition continued to fluctuate while at the asylum, but after a few months of improvement, he gained permission to go outside of the hospital grounds with the company of a carer. In the area surrounding the asylum, van Gogh found beautiful cypresses and olive trees and immortalized them in works such asCypresses (1889) and Olive Trees with the Alpilles in the Background (1889). He also painted Irises (1889) in the grounds of the Saint Paul asylum.
"As in previous periods of his life, van Gogh painted almost constantly. Moving away from the work of his admired contemporaries, Bernard and Gauguin, his work became even more expressive and personal. For van Gogh, painting was not an exercise in exploring the magic and mystery of the world but a consolation from the sadness of his life. He was searching for a greater deliberateness, a clearer expression of his ego in the scenes he painted.
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"Theo visited van Gogh often and reacted positively to his new paintings, assuring him that he had a unique talent. Yet Theo’s appraisal of his brother’s experimentation at Saint-Paul was not without criticism. One painting in particular, The Starry Night (1889), was not to Theo’s taste. Completed around June 1889, The Starry Night is now one of the most recognizable works of art in the world and depicts the east-facing view from van Gogh’s bedroom window at Saint Paul. He painted this view dozens of times under different weather conditions but The Starry Night is the only view painted at night. Theo’s criticism of The Starry Night was that it did not seem very spontaneous. He said, “the search for some style is prejudicial to the true sentiment of things.”"
It's funny, they didn't see what seems so obvious now - the turmoil of the very heart and soul of the artist seeking to escape into the constant motion of the heavens, of the galaxies, the very universe.
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"In late summer 1889, van Gogh suffered a relapse and became deeply depressed. Experiencing hallucinations and suicidal thoughts, he attempted to swallow his oil paints on one of his excursions outside of the asylum. In response, Dr. Peyron forbid van Gogh from leaving the asylum. With no new scenes or subjects to paint, van Gogh resorted to painting copies of work by his favorite painters such as Delacroix, Rembrandt, Millet, Corbet, and Daumier. He also made use of himself as a model and painted a number of self-portraits at this time including Blue Self-Portrait (1889).
"In the space of a year, van Gogh completed around 150 paintings at Saint-Paul. While his brother toiled away in solitude, Theo continued to promote his work. In November 1889, van Gogh was invited to take part in a future exhibition with the group Les XX, a famous and progressive artist group based in Belgium. A representative of the group had sought out van Gogh’s work at Pere Tanguy’s store in Paris where he also discovered Cezanne and invited him to contribute to the exhibition. While the invitation did little to rouse van Gogh from his deep depression, he did select six of his best paintings for the show, including two from his sunflower series.
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"In January 1890, an article by critic Albert Aurier entitled “Unknown Painters: Vincent Van Gogh” was published in Mercure de France. Aurier was captivated by van Gogh’s work, impressed by its originality and power. Aurier’s words were so intensely praising that the article actually caused van Gogh to doubt himself. He wrote to Aurier and suggested that his insistence that, “he [Vincent] is the only painter that perceived the chromatism of objects with this intensity,” was better directed at Monticelli.
"Aurier’s article was published at a fortuitous time for van Gogh as his work was causing a stir at the exhibition of Les XX in Brussels. Van Gogh also sold one of his paintings at this show, the very first time he had made a sale. A painter named Anna Bloch bought the piece La Vigne Rouge (1888), which now resides at the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow. Van Gogh’s work was also shown at the Independent Artistes exhibition in Paris around this time, and this selection of paintings led Claude Monet to name van Gogh the best artist in the show. In a healthy person, this newfound success might have had an invigorating effect, but for van Gogh, it caused a serious relapse. He experienced a severe depression that lasted for two months."
Monet praised him, that's high praise indeed!
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"Again, the only release van Gogh could find from his deteriorating mental health was his painting. Unable to leave the asylum and sometimes unable to even leave his studio, he was forced to look to the past for subjects to paint. Van Gogh asked Theo to send him old sketches he had made while living with his parents in the early 1880s. Using these sketches as a basis, he worked from memory and managed to create a small group of paintings that he called “Reminisces of the North.” Van Gogh painted Two Peasant Women Digging in a Snow-Covered Field at Sunset (1889) and Sorrowing Old Man (1889). Working in darker tones, van Gogh’s state of mind shows through in this small body of work that depicts scenes of hardship and sadness.
"There was one joyful occasion in van Gogh’s life during this dark period. In April 1889, Theo married Johanna Bonger, a teacher he had met in Amsterdam. Theo and Johanna had a son on January 31, 1890, who they named Vincent Willem after the boy’s uncle. Van Gogh reacted to this happy news by painting a new work for young Vincent’s nursery. He painted branches of an almond tree in bloom on a blue background and named it Almond Blossom (1889) to celebrate the birth of his nephew. Trees in the first blossom of the spring held an important significance to van Gogh as symbols of hope and awakening, and he went on to paint a whole series of blossoming trees."
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"“The sadness will last forever.”
"—Vincent van Gogh’s last words"
It wouldn't, had he been born in a free culture unlike that of abrahmic societies.
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"By May of 1890, van Gogh was desperate to leave the asylum at Saint-Remy. Still recovering from his last major relapse, he was not cured of his depression, but he was determined to make a life outside of the hospital. Theo arranged for Vincent to move to Auvers-sur-Oise, a northwest suburb of Paris, and live under the care of Dr. Paul Gachet. Gachet ran a private practice in Paris and had treated several of van Gogh’s artist friends, including Paul Cezanne. Gachet himself was an amateur painter, and Theo thought that his brother would benefit from the care of a doctor who was sympathetic to the habits of artists. Auvers was also home to a small community of artists who Theo thought might have a positive influence on van Gogh. Back in 1861, the painter Charles Daubigny had set up a studio in Auvers and over the next three decades had drawn other artists there to seek inspiration in nature.
"Dr. Gachet came recommended, but van Gogh was not convinced of his ability to treat him. In a letter to Theo, he said Gachet seemed “iller than I am, it seemed to me, or let’s say just as much.” Still, van Gogh and Gachet became friends. The pair seemed to share some of the same eccentricities, and van Gogh began work on a portrait of Gachet as a gift. Living at the Auberge-Ravoux Guesthouse, van Gogh became enthusiastic about his future and even reached out to Gauguin with the intention of visiting him in Brittany. Gauguin politely declined to offer an invitation.
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"No matter where van Gogh went, his mental illness was never far behind him, and it followed him to Auvers, arriving a few weeks into his stay. Bad news from Theo exacerbated his condition, and he suffered a severe relapse. Theo’s wife and their new baby son had become dangerously ill, a stroke of bad luck that was made all the more frightening as Theo had just quit his job with Bousson & Valadon art dealers. Theo’s ideas on contemporary art did not mesh well with the owners of the company, and they lost faith in his ability to represent their interests. Theo was under great pressure in both his personal and professional lives, and while he was confident in his ability to set up an art dealership of his own, there was a huge financial risk involved.
"Van Gogh’s life was inextricably bound to Theo’s, and he shared his brother’s stress. Up to now, van Gogh had sold just one of the hundreds of paintings he had completed, and the entire cost of his materials, living expenses, and medical care had fallen squarely on the shoulders of his beloved brother. The realization that Theo’s financial situation may have become unstable induced deep feelings of guilt in van Gogh. He visited Theo in Paris to appraise the situation first-hand but left far from reassured."
"Through it all, van Gogh continued to paint. He completed around 70 oil paintings in a period of around 70 days while living at Auvers. Many of these paintings were an expression of his return to the northern scenes he painted in his earliest days as an artist, but he also painted a pair of portraits of Dr. Gachet and two paintings of Daubigny’s garden.
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"Not long after van Gogh’s trip to Paris, he had a violent quarrel with Dr. Gachet, and the pair parted ways. He would not heed Gachet’s advice to cut down on his alcohol and cigarette consumption and questioned his ability to treat him. Gachet removed himself from van Gogh’s life, and by July 1890, van Gogh was living in a state of complete isolation. During these most difficult weeks in his life, he was absorbed in the vast wheat fields that surrounded Auvers. He captured a turbulent landscape of yellow plains against a stormy sky in July 1890 in the painting Wheatfield with Crows. This is widely believed to be van Gogh’s last painting.
"Van Gogh tried to explain his fascination with the wheat fields to Theo, “They are vast stretches of wheat under troubled skies, and I did not have to go out of my way very much in order to try to express sadness and extreme loneliness. . . . I’m fairly sure that these canvases will tell you what I cannot say in words, that is, how healthy and invigorating I find the countryside.”"
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"On July 27, 1890, Vincent van Gogh walked into these wheat fields and shot himself in the chest. He did not die immediately and was able to walk back to his room where two doctors later tended to his wound. The bullet had not hit any of van Gogh’s internal organs but had deflected off one of his ribs and was potentially lodged in his spine. The doctors were not able to remove the bullet, and there was no surgeon in Auvers. The doctors notified Theo of his brother’s condition, and he rushed immediately to van Gogh’s side, who explained his desperate act as being “for the good of everyone.”
"Without surgery, van Gogh could not survive his injury, and within a few hours of Theo’s arrival, in the early hours of July 29, 1890, Vincent van Gogh died of an infection. According to Theo, van Gogh’s last words were, “The sadness will last forever.” Vincent van Gogh was 37 years old."
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"“Life itself, too, is forever turning an infinitely vacant, dispiriting blank side towards man on which nothing appears, any more than it does on a blank canvas. But no matter how vacant and vain, how dead life may appear to be, the man of faith, of energy, of warmth, who knows something, will not be put off so easily.”
"—Vincent van Gogh"
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"Van Gogh’s funeral took place the day after his death on July 30, 1890. Theo carried out the difficult tasks of completing his brother’s death certification documents at Auvers Town Hall before sending out invitations to the funeral to all of their friends. Theo wanted as many people as possible to attend van Gogh’s funeral despite the short notice and included the Paris to Auvers train timetable as encouragement.
"Theo had van Gogh’s body set out in his room at the Auberge-Ravoux guest house and surrounded him with his most recent canvasses and swathes of yellow flowers, Vincent’s favorite. The paint on many of the canvasses was still wet. His easel, folding stool, and painting supplies were displayed alongside his coffin. Friends and family arrived to view van Gogh’s body, and Dr. Gachet took the opportunity to sketch Vincent’s face on his deathbed.
"Many of van Gogh’s friends attended his funeral, including Pere Tanguy, Lucien Pissarro, Auguste Lauzet, and Emile Bernard. Gauguin, who declined to attend the funeral, wrote later in a note to a friend, “perhaps there is something to be learned from the dreadful business of van Gogh.” A hearse arrived at the Auberge-Ravoux in the afternoon and carried van Gogh’s coffin to the cemetery, which was located on a little hill above the wheat fields. The funeral party followed the hearse on foot. Dr. Gachet managed to say a few words at the funeral as Theo was too overcome with emotion. Suppressing his own bitter tears, Gachet praised van Gogh as an honest man and a great artist with only two aims, “art and humanity.”
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"After van Gogh’s death, Theo poured all his grief into organizing a retrospective of his brother’s work. Initially, Theo wanted the art dealer Paul Durand-Ruel to handle the retrospective, but Durand-Ruel was close to bankruptcy and could not afford to lend his gallery to a memorial exhibition that might not make any money. Octave Maus and Paul Signac stepped in and offered their support. As well as a large exhibition, Theo wanted to create a large catalog of van Gogh’s work into which he would insert some of the thousands of letters he and his brothers had exchanged.
"Unbeknownst to most, perhaps even to Vincent, Theo himself had been ill in the months leading up to his brother’s suicide. With the stress of van Gogh’s death, his own lack of employment, and the exertion of putting together a large exhibition, Theo became gravely ill. In Paris, Theo was diagnosed as suffering from progressive paralysis, and in November 1890, he was admitted to a psychiatric hospital in Den Dolder, Utrecht. Theo’s symptoms were the product of long-term untreated syphilis and mental exhaustion. By December, Theo was diagnosed with dementia paralytica, known simply as “disease of the brain.” Less than six months after van Gogh’s death, on January 25, 1891, Theo van Gogh died. The cause of death was recorded as “heredity, chronic disease, overwork, sadness.”
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"Friends of Vincent and Theo who had promised to exhibit van Gogh’s work kept their word. Memorial exhibitions were held in Brussels, Paris, The Hague, and Antwerp, and ten of van Gogh’s paintings were shown at the Salon des Independants in 1891 where they were the most admired works in the show. This show marked the start of van Gogh’s posthumous fame. Aurier, who had first introduced the European art world to van Gogh’s work with his 1890 article “Unknown Painters: Vincent Van Gogh,” continued to write about van Gogh after his death. Emile Bernard also wrote on van Gogh’s unrecognized talent while his tragically short and tormented life provided captivating material for authors. A 1924 novel by Louis Pierard, titled Le vie traqigue de Vincent van Gogh (The Tragic Life of Vincent van Gogh) was a roaring success and later translated into seven languages.
"On Theo’s death, his widow Jo van Gogh suddenly became responsible for Theo’s extensive art collection and van Gogh’s enormous body of work that included several hundred paintings and drawings and a huge collection of letters. Jo had only known Theo for a short time before they were married and had met van Gogh only a handful of times. She also had a newborn baby she now had to raise alone.
"Yet Jo was dedicated to doing what she could to preserve van Gogh’s legacy. Jo loaned his paintings to exhibitions all over the world, beginning with a small solo show in Paris in 1892. In 1901, the Bernheim-Jeune Gallery in Paris exhibited a van Gogh retrospective that is thought to have heavily influenced the development of the Fauvist approach to painting. Van Gogh’s work was also shown in Cologne in 1912, in New York in 1913, and in Berlin in 1914. His paintings’ perceived worth increased as art institutions began to recognize the power of his work and the influence he had on European art during his short but productive life.
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"In 1914, Jo published a volume of van Gogh’s letters to Theo, intensifying the public’s fascination with the man Arles villagers had called le fou roux (the red-headed madman). On Jo’s death in 1925, her huge collection of paintings by van Gogh and his contemporaries passed to her son, Vincent Willem van Gogh. Vincent allowed a huge loan of his uncle’s paintings to the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam in 1930, and as the decades passed and van Gogh’s fame continued to grow, the people of the Netherlands pressured the government to create a dedicated public museum for the work of their most famous son.
"In 1973, eleven years after the establishment of the Vincent van Gogh Foundation, the Van Gogh Museum finally opened in Amsterdam. Queen Juliana of the Netherlands opened the museum, which operates with the promise that van Gogh’s collection will be accessible to everyone, forever. Today, the Van Gogh Museum welcomes over two million visitors from all parts of the world every year."
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"Van Gogh moved often, from The Hague to Paris, then to Arles, Saint-Remy, and finally, Auvers-sur-Oise. He befriended artists wherever he went, and although he preferred to live far from the urban sprawl in the countryside, his constant correspondence with Theo kept him up to date on artistic developments in Paris. Van Gogh did not work in a vacuum, and it was his most ambitious dream to develop an artists’ commune where he could work with other painters to push the boundaries of art. Sadly, this dream was never realized, and van Gogh was forced to occupy the role of a solitary genius, even as he perished in loneliness.
"Van Gogh followed the developments in Paris but pushed back against a move towards abstraction and symbolism. For him, the purest definition of the art was, “L’art c’est l’homme ajoute a la nature” (art is man added to nature). Vincent van Gogh was faithful to nature and sought only to represent that which he could see. Far from being a realist, he looked for meaning in the natural world and used his paintings to express the emotion he found there. Using color as a vehicle for sensation and brushwork as a means of expression, van Gogh searched for emotional authenticity in representation.
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"In 1888, van Gogh wrote, “I cannot invent my painting completely, on the contrary I find it already in nature, all I have to do is to succeed in recognizing its presence there.”"
"The evolution of van Gogh’s artistic oeuvre happened at lightning speed with thunderous intensity. Only five years elapsed between van Gogh’s painting of what he considered his first masterpiece,The Potato Eaters and his last painting, Wheatfield with Crows. The art world had no hope of keeping up with his output or recognizing his talent in real time. It became the work of subsequent generations to find the true meaning of Vincent van Gogh’s work, to locate the humanity in his swirls of paint on canvas."
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Table of Contents
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Introduction
Vincent as a Boy
Marrying a Prostitute
Art, Love, and Conflicts
Developing His Style in Paris
Escape to Arles
The Incident with the Razor
Van Gogh in the Asylum
The Wheat Fields at Auvers
After van Gogh’s Suicide
Conclusion
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REVIEW
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Introduction
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"Vincent Willem van Gogh is one of the most famous painters of all time. A solitary figure living in poverty, destroying himself to create the artworks that would not be appreciated until long after his death, van Gogh is the archetype of an artist. In van Gogh, the notion that a true artist must suffer for his art and that only the vulnerable can channel pure creativity takes form.
"But van Gogh’s life story paints a different picture to the simple sketch of a starving man contemplating suicide that we’ve come to recognize. The desperate act he committed in 1889 when he severed his ear with a razor does not define him. Van Gogh’s life story is as complicated and as full of joy and sorrow as any other.
"As a young man, van Gogh was convinced that he had experienced a religious calling and pursued a career in the church. But he was not a priest, he was an artist, and as soon as he realized this he took to his artistic training with the same fanaticism he had once channeled into studying the Bible."
That explains much.
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"In just ten years van Gogh painted more than 850 oil paintings and 1,300 drawings, watercolors, and studies. In the last few years of his life when his mental health was at its very worst, van Gogh’s productivity reached its peak, and he created some of his most accomplished and popular works. During a spell at the Saint-Remy asylum, van Gogh painted The Starry Night—one of the most recognizable paintings in the world—out of his bedroom window. And during an ill-fated collaboration with the artist Paul Gauguin that led to the incident with the razor, Vincent painted Bedroom in Arles and Gauguin’s Chair.
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"Van Gogh lived through debilitating mental illness and poverty, but his life was not lived in vain. While his last days were marred by isolation, he did not live or work in solitude and was very much a part of the European art scene. Van Gogh operated on the fringes of the Neo-Impressionist and Symbolist movements, ensuring his uniqueness but also making his work difficult to sell. It’s a cruel twist that van Gogh died by his own hand in abject poverty while today his paintings are some of the most valuable in the world."
Certainly, his name is probably the most well known.
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November 24, 2022 - November 26, 2022.
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Chapter 1. Vincent as a Boy
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"“Someone has a great fire in his soul and nobody ever comes to warm themselves at it, and passers-by see nothing but a little smoke at the top of the chimney and then go on their way.”
"—Vincent van Gogh"
Most renowned writers couldn't have expressed him better. Why, most couldn't have done even so well, so precisely.
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"Vincent Willem van Gogh opened his eyes to the world on March 30, 1853, in the village of Groot Zundert in Brabant, the Netherlands. The future artist was born into a prosperous upper-middle-class family and was the sixth and eldest son of Protestant minister Theodorus van Gogh and his wife, Anna Carbentus. As you would assume, the van Goghs were a religious family and their parenting was strict. A governess educated young Vincent at home with his siblings until it was time for him to join the Zundert village school at age seven."
That ought to read "sixth child and eldest son".
"Vincent is often described as a serious child, an outsider, and a possible genius. These descriptors fit neatly into our perceptions of him as an adult, but it’s hard to say whether his early years were happy or not. As a very young child, Vincent was already developing a love for drawing. The van Gogh family also took long walks together in the countryside surrounding Zundert, instilling in him a deep connection to nature that he would spend much of his adult life trying to capture in oil paint.
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"Anna van Gogh was a disciplinarian, and Vincent later described his childhood as claustrophobic. Yet, when Vincent was given the opportunity to escape the van Gogh household in 1864 by joining a boarding school in Zevenbergen, he rebelled and begged his parents to bring him home. Instead, they sent Vincent, now aged 13, to a middle school closer to home in Tilburg. At Tilburg, the artist Constant Cornelius Huijsmans taught Vincent to capture the overall impression of objects rather than worrying too much about technique. Although Vincent’s interest was piqued, he was unhappy at Tilburg and dropped out before completing his studies."
It's unclear why, increasingly, the word 'completing' has come to replace the good English one of yore, 'finishing', in this context. But it certainly does not make it better.
Especially when, as they do in film journalism in India, write about a film star having 'completed' education and it amounts to stopping short of beginning a college degree, it merely shows show little the person and family - not to mention the said journalist using the word 'completed' rather than 'finished' - thought of possibility of any further development of mind and consciousness of the person.
As for Vincent van Gogh, he certainly could have gone further, judging by his quote above. It only needed a better opportunity.
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"At age 16, van Gogh entered the workplace. In his letters—the most valuable primary source of the artist’s life—he describes his childhood home life as “austere and cold, and sterile.” He was happy to leave it behind. Van Gogh’s first job was at The Hague, working as an apprentice at the Dutch arm of Parisian art dealer Goupil & Cie. He landed the job thanks to the influence of his uncle Cent, who also worked with Goupil & Cie.
"Goupil & Cie dealt primarily in nineteenth-century French and Dutch paintings, and while van Gogh was completing his training, he was surrounded by etchings, paintings, and drawings by the most contemporary artists of the day. He became enamored with works by artists who collectively became known as “School of The Hague” and was influenced by the work of Josef Israels, Millet, Jacob Mavis, and Anton Mauve. Van Gogh’s younger brother, Theo, followed him into the art dealership business, and in 1873, he also began working for Goupil & Cie. Theo was sent to work in Brussels while Vincent was transferred to the London branch, and the brothers began an intense correspondence that would last until Vincent’s death.
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"Van Gogh thrived in London. Living in lodgings on Hackford Road in Stowell, he enjoyed his work and was making a good salary for a man who was only 20 years old. Yet his happiness was short-lived. Van Gogh experienced his first heartbreak in London when he became infatuated with his landlady’s daughter, Eugenie Loyer. Eugenie was, unbeknownst to anyone, already engaged and she firmly rejected Vincent’s advances. Meanwhile, his interest in the art market waned, and the company’s decision to transfer him to Paris only served to increase his resentment towards the entire art market that turned artists’ passion into cold, hard cash. At the same time, van Gogh was experiencing something akin to a calling. Turning to religion for answers, he either resigned or was dismissed from Goupil & Cie in 1876 and decided to follow his father’s example by entering the church and becoming a minister.
"Van Gogh briefly worked as a supply teacher in Ramsgate and then Middlesex, England before becoming the assistant to a Methodist minister named Jones. Although van Gogh was still in the very earliest stages of his religious education, Jones allowed him to give his first sermon a few months into their arrangement. A text of this sermon survives, and in it, van Gogh uses a painting to illuminate his explanation of life as a pilgrimage.
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"However, when van Gogh returned home to his family, who had since moved from Zundert to Etten, they were so worried about his physical and mental health that they insisted he would not return to England but stay with them instead. Van Gogh killed time for a few months by working in a bookshop in Dordrecht but could not shake the deep unhappiness hanging over him. In an attempt to escape the monotony of his life, he studied the Bible with extreme intensity and completely immersed himself in religious life. His habits became monastic, and he became completely frugal.
"In 1877, van Gogh’s family sent him to live with his uncle, Johannes Stricker, in Amsterdam where he intended to study for the entrance exam to the Department of Theology. Stricker was a respected theologian, and under his care, van Gogh became even more religious. He used most of his spare time to translate the Bible into four different languages and fervently studied the practice of Christian confession. Around this time, van Gogh also began to teach himself to draw. Spending hours wandering the museums of Amsterdam, he began making sketches of what he saw but revealed in letters to Theo that he feared drawing would keep him from his religious work.
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"Van Gogh’s religious conviction was, however, not enough to guarantee him a position in the clergy, and he failed his theology entrance exam to the University of Amsterdam. Next, he moved on to the Preparatory School for Evangelists in Laeken where he also failed his three-month course. It was not van Gogh’s academic abilities that were holding him back but his attitude. At Laeken, it was recorded that van Gogh failed his preparatory course because his “lack of submission” made him unsuitable to continue. Despite these setbacks, he became even more fervent in his idealism and even more committed to the Christian cause.
"In January of 1879, van Gogh was successful in securing a six-month placement as a missionary in a coal-mining district of Borinage in Belgium. The workers at Borinage endured extreme poverty, and in a show of solidarity and support, van Gogh took on a life of abject hardship. He gave his lodgings to a homeless person and slept on the floor of a squalid hut. The Evangelist School of Brussels, who was responsible for sending van Gogh to Borinage, deemed his actions unbecoming of a future priest and dismissed him. Still, Van Gogh stayed in Borinage without pay for several months until finally giving in to his parents and returning to Etten in late 1879. It was during this period that van Gogh’s relationship with his father began to deteriorate. Frustrated with his son’s lack of direction, stubbornness, and seeming sabotage of his religious career, Theodorus even advised that he be committed to the lunatic asylum at Geel. Instead, van Gogh would move out of his parents’ house and eventually make his way back to the coal miners."
Potato Eaters?
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November 26, 2022 - November 26, 2022.
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Chapter 2. Marrying a Prostitute
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"“Love many things, for therein lies the true strength, and whosoever loves much performs much, and can accomplish much, and what is done in love is done well.”
"—Vincent van Gogh"
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"While living among the miners of Borinage, van Gogh survived the long days and nights by sketching the miners and reading works by Dickens, Hugo, and Shakespeare. Even at the absolute height of his religious fanaticism, van Gogh was still excited by art, and in his letters to Theo, he asked about his favorite painters and wrote at length about his own experimentation. In August 1880, van Gogh lodged with a miner in Cuesmes and again took up his habit of sketching the scenes around him. He was a self-taught artist and had taught himself to draw using a manual titled Drawing Course by Charles Bargue. With Theo’s support, van Gogh decided that now was the time to devote himself entirely to his art, and in late 1880, he relocated to Brussels to study under Dutch artist Willem Roelofs.
"Even though van Gogh proved many times that he did not have the temperament for formal study, he applied to study at the Academie des Beaux-Arts. By November 1880, he was a student once more, and at the academy, he learned human anatomy and the important rules of perspective. Theo dutifully sent van Gogh money to fund his studies and cover his living expenses. This arrangement would continue for the rest of van Gogh’s life. Theo also sent him prints of artists they both admired, including Millet’s “work in the fields” series and works by Daumier, Daubigny, and the engraver Gustave Dore.
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"In April 1881, van Gogh returned to Etten to live with his parents and focus on improving the artistic skill he had learned at the academy. For the rest of that year, he drew the scenes around him, focusing on landscapes and laborers working in the fields. On the advice of his cousin, the successful artist Anton Mauve, van Gogh also began to experiment with charcoal and pastels at this time. Increasingly passionate about his art, van Gogh became obsessed with the idea of becoming a great artist, but as he focused single-mindedly on his art, his personal life unraveled.
"While Vincent was living in Etten, his already rocky relationship with his father took a turn for the worse. As demonstrated in an exchange of letters between Vincent and Theo, Vincent’s distaste for the morality and religious system of the clergy was driving a wedge between father and son. Theo asked, “what the devil made you so childish and so shameless as to embitter Father and Father’s life and render it almost impossible.” Both of their parents were disappointed that their eldest son had chosen to pursue art as a career. Van Gogh’s future, they were convinced, would contain only financial and social ruin.
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"Van Gogh alienated himself further from his family in August 1881 when he made an unsolicited and unwanted proposal to his cousin Kee. Cornelia “Kee” Vos-Stricker was the daughter of Johannes Stricker and so Vincent’s first cousin. He fell deeply in love with recently-widowed Kee, who had an eight-year-old son, but his feelings were not reciprocated. Characteristically, van Gogh refused to take Kee’s no for an answer. Johannes Stricker grew impatient with his persistence, and, in despair, van Gogh held his left hand over a lit lamp, begging, “Let me see her for as long as I can keep my hand in the flame.” Stricker blew out the flame.
"Newly committed to his work, van Gogh moved back to The Hague and began to take instruction from Mauve. He completed his first oil paintings under Mauve’s tutelage, but the relationship between the cousins soon soured, due in part to van Gogh’s unwillingness to submit to Mauve’s methods. Mauve disapproved of van Gogh’s lifestyle and tendency to hire transient people from the streets of The Hague as models. When Mauve discovered that he had begun a love affair with a sex worker named Clasina Hoornik, who went by the name of “Sien,” he cut off all communications.
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"In January 1882, Sien was 29 years old, pregnant and already taking care of a five-year-old daughter. Seemingly desiring a family of his own, van Gogh proposed to Sien, knowing that they would both be completely ostracized from his religious family if they were to marry. He wanted to take care of Sien, emotionally, spiritually, and financially; to this end, he compromised his artistic ambitions to pursue a career as an illustrator. Things began looking up when van Gogh received a commission from his uncle Cornelius, also an art dealer, to sketch 12 pen drawings of The Hague. Additionally, Sien gave birth to a baby boy who she named Willem, on July 2, 1882.
"Again, happiness for van Gogh was incredibly brief. His uncle didn’t like the realistic drawings he had produced of The Hague, and van Gogh made no money from the series. With him unable to support Sien and her two children, Sien may have returned to the prostitution. Life at home became unbearable, and, unable to care for her children, Sien was forced to give her daughter to her mother and her newborn son to her brother. At his father’s insistence, van Gogh abandoned Sien and her children completely in late 1883. Sadly, Sien’s story ended in 1904 when she drowned herself in the River Scheldt."
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November 26, 2022 - November 26, 2022.
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Chapter 3. Art, Love, and Conflicts
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"“Personally I am convinced that in the long run one gets better results from painting them in all their coarseness than from introducing a conventional sweetness.”
"—Vincent van Gogh"
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"Vincent fled The Hague and its bad memories when in September 1883 he moved to the northern landscape of Drenthe. Drenthe was fertile ground for painters and landscape artists. Drenthe’s heathlands and moors had inspired Mauve, van Rappard, and Max Liebermann, and Vincent sought similar inspiration in the area and its people. Working exclusively in oils, van Gogh joined a long tradition of Dutch painters and captured the daily lives of Drenthe’s rural laborers.
"In The Hague, van Gogh couldn’t afford to pay for models, but in Drenthe, he couldn’t find willing subjects to pose for him. This struggle, the realities of a harsh northern winter, and the crippling loneliness he felt in Drenthe led him to abandon his new home in a little over two months. Once more, van Gogh returned to his parents’ home, now located in Nuenen, Brabant. This time he stayed for over two years.
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"During these two years in Nuenen between early 1884 and 1886, van Gogh completed hundreds of oil paintings, watercolors, and drawings. The masterpiece of this period was The Potato Eaters (1885). In 1887, van Gogh referred to The Potato Eaters in a letter as “the best thing I have done.” The painting represents a peasant family sitting around a table eating their evening meal. Unlike his contemporaries, Millet and Israels, who lent their peasant subjects an air of romantic dignity, van Gogh attempted to depict his subjects exactly as he saw them. The colors used in The Potato Eaters are somber, earthy, and serve to accentuate the coarseness of the scene depicted. Van Gogh saw this work as his masterpiece and a manifesto of his particular artistic mission: to create a painting that depicted the harshest lives exactly as they were lived.
"Along with The Potato Eaters, van Gogh produced a number of character studies of weavers and their cottages. Similarly dark and earthy, these character studies were in line with van Gogh’s desire to convey the peasants’ way of life with veracity. In a letter to Theo, Vincent says, “Personally I am convinced that in the long run one gets better results from painting them in all their coarseness than from introducing a conventional sweetness.”
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"Van Gogh sent The Potato Eaters and his character studies to his brother, who had managed to get a dealer in Paris interested in the work. In August of 1866, van Gogh’s paintings were publicly exhibited for the first time in the windows of the Leurs dealer in The Hague. The paintings did not sell, and van Gogh complained that there was not enough effort being made on his part to find a buyer. Theo countered that the paintings were simply too dark for the current vogue for bright impressionism.
"As had become a pattern in van Gogh’s life, any small victory in his work was offset by traumatic events in his personal life. He was involved with a local woman named Margot Begemann in August 1885; Vincent and Margot were in love and planned to marry, but both the Begemann and van Gogh families opposed the marriage. When van Gogh relented and agreed that he and Margot would not be married, Margot was distraught and tried to kill herself by taking an overdose of strychnine.
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"Months after this disaster, Vincent’s father died suddenly of a heart attack. The relationship between van Gogh and his father had been strained and combative for years, but his sudden death devastated Vincent. Grieving the loss of a lover and his father, van Gogh found himself publicly shamed when the Catholic curate accused him of having sex with a peasant girl and making her pregnant. The curate banned any citizen of Nuenen from posing for van Gogh, and at that final straw, he fled once more, landing this time in Antwerp.
"In Antwerp, van Gogh entered the next phase in the development of his distinctive style. Having studied color theory according to the French romantic painter Eugene Delacroix during earlier bouts of incessant reading, van Gogh began to experiment with his own palette. In Antwerp, he could see works by great seventeenth-century painters such as Peter Paul Rubens and spent hours admiring the heavy, rich colors in his work.
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"It was also in Antwerp that van Gogh was first exposed to Japanese prints. In the 1850s, Japan had opened its ports to invite an exchange of trade with the west. Japanese art became available in Europe in the form of easily transportable prints, and by the 1860s the influence of what became known as Japanism had infused the work of some of the most significant artists of the day. Van Gogh was not immune to the seductive allure of exotic Japanese culture. He decorated his shabby Antwerp room with Japanese prints and later incorporated elements from them in his own paintings.
"This period in Antwerp nourished van Gogh creatively, but physically, he was a wreck. He spent the money Theo sent him almost exclusively on painting materials and models to the detriment of his health. Living in extreme poverty, van Gogh admitted to Theo in February 1866 that for the last eight months he had eaten just six hot meals. He subsisted by drinking coffee, smoking tobacco, and eating bread, further aggravating his fragile health with bouts of heavy drinking. After this admission to Theo, van Gogh was hospitalized for various health complaints that may have included syphilis.
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"Van Gogh’s lifelong aversion to academia didn’t deter him from enrolling in the Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp. Although he was essentially a self-taught artist, he did not reject traditional teaching methods and used many of the same technical manuals to teach himself as those used in art schools of the time. Van Gogh did, however, make a habit of challenging his tutors. The director of the Academy, Charles Verlat, rowed with van Gogh over his unconventional style, and he also had an infamous run-in with Eugene Siberdt. On being asked to draw the Venus of Milo to specific criteria, van Gogh instead drew the naked, armless torso of a Flemish peasant woman. When Sibert made corrections to the drawing, van Gogh flew into a rage. This altercation led him to quit the Academy of Fine Arts from which he never graduated."
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November 26, 2022 - November 26, 2022.
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Chapter 4. Developing His Style in Paris
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"“When one sees them for the first time one is bitterly, bitterly disappointed and thinks them slovenly, ugly, badly painted, badly drawn, bad in colour, everything that’s miserable.”
"—Vincent van Gogh on Neo-Impressionists"
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"Van Gogh had already demonstrated his tendency towards fanaticism by overworking himself to the point of illness as a student. In March 1886, he moved to Paris determined to become a successful artist and took his extreme self-discipline with him. Initially, van Gogh moved in with Theo in his apartment on Rue Laval in Montmartre. By June, it was clear that this apartment was too small and the brothers moved into a larger apartment on Rue Lepic.
"In Paris, van Gogh attended painting classes at the studio of Felix Cormon. Cormon was well-known as an academic painter who taught his students how to capture perspective, proportion, light, and shadow without limiting them to rigid and traditional painting forms. Van Gogh thrived under Cormon’s tuition. At Cormon’s studio, he met Henri de Toulouse Lautrec, Louis Anquetin, and Emile Bernard and became part of a circle of like-minded painters for the first time.
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"While van Gogh was working at Cormon’s studio between April and May of 1886, Theo was getting used to his new role as the director of the Paris branch of art dealers Boussod & Valadon. Around this time, Theo introduced his brother to Renoir, Degas, Pissarro, and pointillists Seurat and Signac, all of whom eventually influenced his work. Julien Tanguy’s paint shop first exhibited many of these artists in Paris in 1886. This Neo-Impressionist exhibition generated interest in these new painting styles in France and the rest of Europe, but van Gogh’s opinion on them was largely negative.
"Viewing Impressionist works through the traditional criteria of design, composition, and use of color, van Gogh found much of the work in the exhibition lacking. At this stage in his artistic development, he still preferred conventional depictions of simple rural life, similar to those he had tried to capture amongst the miners of Borinage. Speaking of the Neo-Impressionists in a letter to his sister, Wil, van Gogh said, “when one sees them for the first time one is bitterly, bitterly disappointed and thinks them slovenly, ugly, badly painted, badly drawn, bad in colour, everything that’s miserable.”
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"During his time in Paris, van Gogh painted constantly, capturing cityscapes, still lives, and portraits of his acquaintances in the same muted tones. Then one day, he saw the work of Adolphe Monticelli at the Galerie Delareybarette. Van Gogh was dazzled by Monticelli’s use of color, largely achieved using vivid tints. Under the influence of his new friend Signac, van Gogh finally brightened his palette and experimented with the possibilities of pointillism. Pointillism is a scientific approach to painting where small dots of color are applied close together to give the illusion of a blended hue. Van Gogh captured the cityscape of Montmartre and Asnieres using pointillist techniques and was pleased with the results.
"He also experimented with the Japanese ukiyo-e woodblock prints he had become interested in Antwerp. Thanks to Theo’s support, van Gogh was more financially comfortable in Paris than he had been for some time and was able to collect hundreds of these prints. In 1887, he painted The Courtesan, essentially a copy of an original print that he found on the cover of a magazine. While this painting looks unlike any other of van Gogh’s, it is an example of his ability to reproduce a particular style while adding his own signature to the finished work.
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"Around this time, van Gogh met Gauguin, and the pair struck up a friendship. Gauguin’s approach to painting led later artists to see him as a key figure in the Symbolist movement. Gauguin’s intuitive, fluid use of color was the very opposite of the Pointillist’s approach, and van Gogh found himself torn between these very different approaches.
"In 1887, van Gogh launched his own exhibition, displaying the work of his new friends, including Bernard, Anquetin, and possibly Toulouse-Lautrec at the Restaurant du Chalet on Boulevard de Clichy. To his disappointment, however, no Neo-Impressionists would show their work alongside that of Bernard and Gaugin, and the exhibition was not a great success. Part way through the exhibition, van Gogh fell out with the restaurant owner and withdrew his own paintings from the show. With his Neo-Impressionist and Symbolist friends taking painting in very different directions, van Gogh worked even harder to capture the essence of himself in his work.
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"Less than a year into their co-habiting, Theo complained that he found living with Vincent intolerable. Exactly what Theo found intolerable about his brother is not clear, but it was likely related to his tendency towards overwork, his heavy drinking, and his temperament. Van Gogh struggled to live in large cities for long periods but enjoyed the hive of artistic activity he found there, and so in early 1887, he moved into his own apartment in Ansieres. Ansieres was a quiet suburb in the northwest of Paris with easy access to the city. At the time, Signac also lived in Ansieres, and he and van Gogh became good friends.
"By early 1888, van Gogh had completed hundreds of paintings in Paris that reflected a steady but dramatic evolution of style. His work had grown steadily brighter and showed the beginnings of his signature short-brush strokes. Instead of focusing on the plight of rural workers as he had in works like The Potato Eaters, van Gogh found inspiration in Paris’ cafes, boulevards, and people. Finding the money to pay for models was challenging for him, and during this period, he removed the need for sitters by painting a number of self-portraits.
"However, van Gogh’s work ethic had again become dangerous. In February 1888, burned out both physically and creatively, he decided to leave Paris and head south. In the south of France, he hoped he would find a new, colorful yet relaxing environment that would re-invigorate his work and bring peace to his life. It had worked for Cezanne, who had recently spent time in his birthplace of Aix-en-Provence and Monticelli who had painted his birthplace of Marseilles. So, in February of 1888, van Gogh moved to Arles in Provence."
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November 26, 2022 - November 26, 2022.
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Chapter 5. Escape to Arles
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"“I am interested in all that really exists; I have neither the desire nor the courage to search for the ideal.”
"—Vincent van Gogh"
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"At first Arles appeared to be the perfect cure for van Gogh, whose unhealthy life in Paris had left him physically wasted. The bright and plentiful colors of the Arles landscape had a positive effect on his creative charge, but the fresh air and solitude did not quash his tendency towards excess. Spending extended periods alone and painting fanatically, van Gogh hardly ate and subsisted mostly on alcohol and tobacco. Physically, he was as much of a wreck in Arles as he had been in Paris.
"Artistically, van Gogh returned to earlier themes, painting local peasants working in the fields, capturing orchards of trees in blossom, and attempting seascapes. The more he painted, the more he loosened up and tried new approaches to brushwork and color, allowing ultramarine and yellow tones to dominate his canvasses. Like many of the artists van Gogh was associated with, he exchanged a few of his best paintings from this time. He sent seven canvasses to Port-Aven in October 1888 in exchange for new paintings by Charles Laval, Bernard, and Gaugin.
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"Van Gogh was delighted with his progress in Arles and noted in letters that he was moving away from Impressionist ways of working and edging closer towards finding his own unique expression. van Gogh’s burgeoning style was guided by emotion, and his efforts were focused on translating that emotion with color. As he explained in a letter to Gauguin, colors became “poetic concepts” to him. Using what he had learned from Japanese prints to simplify the forms in his paintings, van Gogh produced some of his most famous works in Arles.
"But living and working in a constant state of expressive urgency soon caused van Gogh to become emotionally unstable. In a letter to Theo, he said, “you know I’ve always thought it ridiculous for painters to live alone . . . You always lose when you’re isolated.” In an attempt to combat his isolation but also share his progress with others, van Gogh had the idea of establishing an artists’ colony in Arles.
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"Arles, he believed, was the perfect location for a community of artists to thrive. Such a community had been successful in Brittany where Gauguin had established the Port-Aven School. Van Gogh had also seen similar communities work in Barbizon and The Hague. He believed he could invigorate his painting by working with a like-minded group to break new ground through collaboration. Theo was encouraged by his brother’s plan, in part because he hoped company would stabilize Vincent’s mood, and he agreed to sell the group’s works at his dealership in Paris.
"Keen to start making his dream of an artists’ colony a reality, van Gogh rented four rooms in the famous Yellow House on Place Lamartine. Abandoned for months and unfurnished, the house was available at the low price of 15 francs per month. Initially, van Gogh remained living at the Cafe de la Gare, where he was cared for by friends, Joseph and Marie Ginoux, and used the Yellow House as an expansive studio. He envisioned using part of the house as a gallery and invited Gauguin and Bernard to join him in his new venture.
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"Gauguin and Bernard had been making great strides in their own painting and, along with Anquetin, had developed a new style that later became known as Synthesism. Like the French literature of the day, Synthetism was concerned with Symbolism and, unlike Impressionism, championed an intellectual approach to painting. Gaugin and his contemporaries used bold outlines to separate different forms, giving their paintings a flat, abstract effect. Van Gogh admired these painters, particularly Gauguin, and sent invitations to join him at the Yellow House. The weeks passed, but no replies came.
"Theo and Vincent had kept up a close correspondence since Vincent arrived in Arles, and Theo was fully aware that his brother’s mental health was declining. In one letter to Theo, van Gogh revealed that he was “once more reduced to almost a state of madness.” He pointed to what he saw as his double nature, that of a monk and a painter, and said that without these two selves he would surely have been reduced to complete madness long ago. Desperate to have someone watching over him, Theo stepped in to convince Gauguin to join van Gogh in the Yellow House. Theo agreed to exhibit Gaugin’s paintings and pay his travel expenses, an arrangement that pleased Gauguin enough that he arrived at the Yellow House at the end of October 1888.
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"Gauguin did not fall in love with Arles to the extent that van Gogh had. Van Gogh’s fascination with the provincial way of life and remarkable light that charged the Arles landscape left Gauguin cold. Yet van Gogh thrived with his companion, working and theorizing by his side, and did all he could to encourage Gauguin to stay for as long as possible, even heeding to Gauguin’s advice on his painting. For the first time, van Gogh painted from memory without a model in front of him and embraced a looser, dreamier aesthetic that can be most clearly seen in Memory of the Garden at Etten.
"Although respectful of the man he admired, van Gogh did not follow Gauguin’s tutelage for long. He had no taste for the abstract and said in a letter to Theo, “I am interested in all that really exists; I have neither the desire nor the courage to search for the ideal.” His aim was to capture the emotional energy of the reality around him, while Gauguin tried to imagine a different reality altogether. The pair worked reasonably well together for a little over a month during which time van Gogh created some of his best-known works. Van Gogh’s Chair, The Night Café , Bedroom in Arles, Starry Night Over the Rhone, and Still Life: Vase with Twelve Sunflowers were all painted at the Yellow House with the intention that they would adorn the walls of the house’s gallery."
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November 26, 2022 - November 26, 2022.
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Chapter 6. The Incident with the Razor
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"“Refrain until after riper reflection on both sides, from speaking ill of our poor little yellow house.”
"—Vincent van Gogh to Paul Gauguin"
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"When Gauguin first arrived in Arles, van Gogh was thrilled to have him and looked forward to a fruitful collaboration between two artists. However, as time passed it became clear that the friendship was doomed to fail. The two men had vastly different ideas on what constituted good painting, a disagreement that could have motivated them both, yet their opposing personalities made living together at the Yellow House volatile.
"As time drew on, van Gogh felt increasingly belittled by Gauguin who was arrogant in his insistence that his technique was the only true way to paint. The pair got into intense arguments that lasted long into the night. Gauguin was unhappy in Arles, but van Gogh was emotionally unstable and terrified of abandonment. The friendly relationship between them disintegrated until it reached a breaking point and their frequent arguments descended into violence.
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"According to Gauguin who wrote about the incident to follow in his memoir, van Gogh became agitated one night in the local café. The night had been completely ordinary, and then without any warning, van Gogh threw a glass of absinthe over Gauguin. A short time later, van Gogh followed Gauguin when he left the house to take a walk. Again, without provocation, van Gogh threatened Gauguin with a razor. It’s possible that van Gogh knew that Gauguin was planning to leave him, and, unable to deal with the emotions that caused, he lost control.
"Gauguin escaped van Gogh and spent the night at a hotel. That night, alone in the Yellow House, van Gogh performed the desperate act for which he is sadly remembered. Using an open razor, he sliced off his own ear. He wrapped the ear in newspaper and set out to a local brothel where he and Gauguin were regular customers. After handing the ear to a woman at the brothel, van Gogh returned to the Yellow House. The woman at the brothel notified the police who went immediately to the Yellow House and found van Gogh, bloody and unconscious, on the floor. The police roused van Gogh and took him to the hospital in Arles.
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"The woman at the brothel sent the ear on to the hospital, but it had been detached too long for the doctors to reattach it. Van Gogh asked for Gauguin frequently as he recovered, but Gauguin refused to see him. After a day or two, Gauguin left Arles for Paris and never saw van Gogh again. Later, van Gogh wrote to Gauguin and humbly asked him to “refrain until after riper reflection on both sides, from speaking ill of our poor little yellow house.” Theo took the first train he could from Paris to Arles to be with his brother. According to Theo, van Gogh showed symptoms of that “most dreadful of illness, of madness, and an attack of fievre chaude.” The doctors told Theo that it was possible that his brother would remain insane, it was too early to tell. Van Gogh himself seemed calm and was fully aware that he had experienced a mental break, as he could remember nothing of the incident itself.
"The hospital discharged the artist after two weeks of care, and he returned to his Yellow House. Van Gogh painted while in the hospital and presented his doctor, Dr. Felix Rey, with a portrait as a thank you for his sympathetic care. Dr. Rey was an intern, only 23 years old at the time he met van Gogh, but genuinely cared about his wellbeing. Rey did not, however, care for van Gogh’s portrait of him and used it for many years to repair a chicken coop. Rey took a particular dislike to van Gogh’s use of the color red in his rendering of his hair and his decision to use green in the wallpapered background. Portrait of Doctor Felix Rey (1888) now belongs to the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts and has an estimated worth of 50 million dollars.
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"When released from the hospital, van Gogh tried to return to his life before the incident and took his easel and painting supplies out into Arles to paint. Aware that his mental health was still precarious and that he could not guarantee that he would not suffer another relapse, van Gogh did not invite Gauguin or any other painters to join him. For now, he returned to solitude.
"Sadly, the local community of Arles did not appreciate van Gogh’s attempt at rehabilitation. The Arles newspaper had run a short report on his self-harm incident causing small-town gossip to spread. The citizens of Arles united and signed a petition to have van Gogh interned. Despite having visited him in the hospital after he maimed himself, friends of Vincent’s, the Ginoux family, also signed the petition. Locals began referring to van Gogh as “le fou roux,” meaning the redheaded madman, and in March 1889, the police closed down the Yellow House. Bitterly disappointed but lacking the strength to fight for his independence, van Gogh voluntarily entered the Saint-Paul-de-Mausole psychiatric hospital in Saint-Rémy."
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November 26, 2022 - November 26, 2022.
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Chapter 7. Van Gogh in the Asylum
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"“When I have a terrible need of—shall I say the word—religion. Then I go out and paint the stars.”
"—Vincent van Gogh"
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"Theo did not initially support van Gogh’s decision to commit himself to an asylum. The Saint-Paul-de-Mausole asylum was a former monastery located around 19 miles from Arles that was managed by a former naval doctor, Theophile Peyron. Dr. Peyron severely limited van Gogh’s access to the outside world, something that Theo thought would exacerbate his brother’s depression. Van Gogh wrote to Theo, however, and explained that he was simply unable to live alone and unable move forward with his life. In the asylum, he lived in two rooms with bars on the windows, probably former monk’s quarters, and used one of the rooms as a studio.
"The asylum did not offer van Gogh any specific cure for his mental illness, yet the tranquil surroundings and respite from being responsible for his own wellbeing was an escape of sorts. He accepted that he was unwell but with that acceptance came a sense of fatalism; he did not think he would ever be well again. Dr. Peyron restricted van Gogh’s movements, which in turn restricted the subject matter of his paintings. Under these restrictions, painting became van Gogh’s salvation and the only thing that stopped him from sliding into the same morose apathy he saw in the other asylum inmates.
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"Theo made a special effort to send his brother letters full of news from Paris and special deliveries of magazines and books. Meanwhile, van Gogh painted the asylum and its gardens, producingThe Garden of Saint Paul Hospital (1889), Vestibule of the Asylum (1889), and Saint-Remy (1889) during the first months of his stay. His condition continued to fluctuate while at the asylum, but after a few months of improvement, he gained permission to go outside of the hospital grounds with the company of a carer. In the area surrounding the asylum, van Gogh found beautiful cypresses and olive trees and immortalized them in works such asCypresses (1889) and Olive Trees with the Alpilles in the Background (1889). He also painted Irises (1889) in the grounds of the Saint Paul asylum.
"As in previous periods of his life, van Gogh painted almost constantly. Moving away from the work of his admired contemporaries, Bernard and Gauguin, his work became even more expressive and personal. For van Gogh, painting was not an exercise in exploring the magic and mystery of the world but a consolation from the sadness of his life. He was searching for a greater deliberateness, a clearer expression of his ego in the scenes he painted.
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"Theo visited van Gogh often and reacted positively to his new paintings, assuring him that he had a unique talent. Yet Theo’s appraisal of his brother’s experimentation at Saint-Paul was not without criticism. One painting in particular, The Starry Night (1889), was not to Theo’s taste. Completed around June 1889, The Starry Night is now one of the most recognizable works of art in the world and depicts the east-facing view from van Gogh’s bedroom window at Saint Paul. He painted this view dozens of times under different weather conditions but The Starry Night is the only view painted at night. Theo’s criticism of The Starry Night was that it did not seem very spontaneous. He said, “the search for some style is prejudicial to the true sentiment of things.”"
It's funny, they didn't see what seems so obvious now - the turmoil of the very heart and soul of the artist seeking to escape into the constant motion of the heavens, of the galaxies, the very universe.
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"In late summer 1889, van Gogh suffered a relapse and became deeply depressed. Experiencing hallucinations and suicidal thoughts, he attempted to swallow his oil paints on one of his excursions outside of the asylum. In response, Dr. Peyron forbid van Gogh from leaving the asylum. With no new scenes or subjects to paint, van Gogh resorted to painting copies of work by his favorite painters such as Delacroix, Rembrandt, Millet, Corbet, and Daumier. He also made use of himself as a model and painted a number of self-portraits at this time including Blue Self-Portrait (1889).
"In the space of a year, van Gogh completed around 150 paintings at Saint-Paul. While his brother toiled away in solitude, Theo continued to promote his work. In November 1889, van Gogh was invited to take part in a future exhibition with the group Les XX, a famous and progressive artist group based in Belgium. A representative of the group had sought out van Gogh’s work at Pere Tanguy’s store in Paris where he also discovered Cezanne and invited him to contribute to the exhibition. While the invitation did little to rouse van Gogh from his deep depression, he did select six of his best paintings for the show, including two from his sunflower series.
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"In January 1890, an article by critic Albert Aurier entitled “Unknown Painters: Vincent Van Gogh” was published in Mercure de France. Aurier was captivated by van Gogh’s work, impressed by its originality and power. Aurier’s words were so intensely praising that the article actually caused van Gogh to doubt himself. He wrote to Aurier and suggested that his insistence that, “he [Vincent] is the only painter that perceived the chromatism of objects with this intensity,” was better directed at Monticelli.
"Aurier’s article was published at a fortuitous time for van Gogh as his work was causing a stir at the exhibition of Les XX in Brussels. Van Gogh also sold one of his paintings at this show, the very first time he had made a sale. A painter named Anna Bloch bought the piece La Vigne Rouge (1888), which now resides at the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow. Van Gogh’s work was also shown at the Independent Artistes exhibition in Paris around this time, and this selection of paintings led Claude Monet to name van Gogh the best artist in the show. In a healthy person, this newfound success might have had an invigorating effect, but for van Gogh, it caused a serious relapse. He experienced a severe depression that lasted for two months."
Monet praised him, that's high praise indeed!
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"Again, the only release van Gogh could find from his deteriorating mental health was his painting. Unable to leave the asylum and sometimes unable to even leave his studio, he was forced to look to the past for subjects to paint. Van Gogh asked Theo to send him old sketches he had made while living with his parents in the early 1880s. Using these sketches as a basis, he worked from memory and managed to create a small group of paintings that he called “Reminisces of the North.” Van Gogh painted Two Peasant Women Digging in a Snow-Covered Field at Sunset (1889) and Sorrowing Old Man (1889). Working in darker tones, van Gogh’s state of mind shows through in this small body of work that depicts scenes of hardship and sadness.
"There was one joyful occasion in van Gogh’s life during this dark period. In April 1889, Theo married Johanna Bonger, a teacher he had met in Amsterdam. Theo and Johanna had a son on January 31, 1890, who they named Vincent Willem after the boy’s uncle. Van Gogh reacted to this happy news by painting a new work for young Vincent’s nursery. He painted branches of an almond tree in bloom on a blue background and named it Almond Blossom (1889) to celebrate the birth of his nephew. Trees in the first blossom of the spring held an important significance to van Gogh as symbols of hope and awakening, and he went on to paint a whole series of blossoming trees."
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November 26, 2022 - November 26, 2022.
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Chapter 8. The Wheat Fields at Auvers
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"“The sadness will last forever.”
"—Vincent van Gogh’s last words"
It wouldn't, had he been born in a free culture unlike that of abrahmic societies.
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"By May of 1890, van Gogh was desperate to leave the asylum at Saint-Remy. Still recovering from his last major relapse, he was not cured of his depression, but he was determined to make a life outside of the hospital. Theo arranged for Vincent to move to Auvers-sur-Oise, a northwest suburb of Paris, and live under the care of Dr. Paul Gachet. Gachet ran a private practice in Paris and had treated several of van Gogh’s artist friends, including Paul Cezanne. Gachet himself was an amateur painter, and Theo thought that his brother would benefit from the care of a doctor who was sympathetic to the habits of artists. Auvers was also home to a small community of artists who Theo thought might have a positive influence on van Gogh. Back in 1861, the painter Charles Daubigny had set up a studio in Auvers and over the next three decades had drawn other artists there to seek inspiration in nature.
"Dr. Gachet came recommended, but van Gogh was not convinced of his ability to treat him. In a letter to Theo, he said Gachet seemed “iller than I am, it seemed to me, or let’s say just as much.” Still, van Gogh and Gachet became friends. The pair seemed to share some of the same eccentricities, and van Gogh began work on a portrait of Gachet as a gift. Living at the Auberge-Ravoux Guesthouse, van Gogh became enthusiastic about his future and even reached out to Gauguin with the intention of visiting him in Brittany. Gauguin politely declined to offer an invitation.
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"No matter where van Gogh went, his mental illness was never far behind him, and it followed him to Auvers, arriving a few weeks into his stay. Bad news from Theo exacerbated his condition, and he suffered a severe relapse. Theo’s wife and their new baby son had become dangerously ill, a stroke of bad luck that was made all the more frightening as Theo had just quit his job with Bousson & Valadon art dealers. Theo’s ideas on contemporary art did not mesh well with the owners of the company, and they lost faith in his ability to represent their interests. Theo was under great pressure in both his personal and professional lives, and while he was confident in his ability to set up an art dealership of his own, there was a huge financial risk involved.
"Van Gogh’s life was inextricably bound to Theo’s, and he shared his brother’s stress. Up to now, van Gogh had sold just one of the hundreds of paintings he had completed, and the entire cost of his materials, living expenses, and medical care had fallen squarely on the shoulders of his beloved brother. The realization that Theo’s financial situation may have become unstable induced deep feelings of guilt in van Gogh. He visited Theo in Paris to appraise the situation first-hand but left far from reassured."
"Through it all, van Gogh continued to paint. He completed around 70 oil paintings in a period of around 70 days while living at Auvers. Many of these paintings were an expression of his return to the northern scenes he painted in his earliest days as an artist, but he also painted a pair of portraits of Dr. Gachet and two paintings of Daubigny’s garden.
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"Not long after van Gogh’s trip to Paris, he had a violent quarrel with Dr. Gachet, and the pair parted ways. He would not heed Gachet’s advice to cut down on his alcohol and cigarette consumption and questioned his ability to treat him. Gachet removed himself from van Gogh’s life, and by July 1890, van Gogh was living in a state of complete isolation. During these most difficult weeks in his life, he was absorbed in the vast wheat fields that surrounded Auvers. He captured a turbulent landscape of yellow plains against a stormy sky in July 1890 in the painting Wheatfield with Crows. This is widely believed to be van Gogh’s last painting.
"Van Gogh tried to explain his fascination with the wheat fields to Theo, “They are vast stretches of wheat under troubled skies, and I did not have to go out of my way very much in order to try to express sadness and extreme loneliness. . . . I’m fairly sure that these canvases will tell you what I cannot say in words, that is, how healthy and invigorating I find the countryside.”"
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"On July 27, 1890, Vincent van Gogh walked into these wheat fields and shot himself in the chest. He did not die immediately and was able to walk back to his room where two doctors later tended to his wound. The bullet had not hit any of van Gogh’s internal organs but had deflected off one of his ribs and was potentially lodged in his spine. The doctors were not able to remove the bullet, and there was no surgeon in Auvers. The doctors notified Theo of his brother’s condition, and he rushed immediately to van Gogh’s side, who explained his desperate act as being “for the good of everyone.”
"Without surgery, van Gogh could not survive his injury, and within a few hours of Theo’s arrival, in the early hours of July 29, 1890, Vincent van Gogh died of an infection. According to Theo, van Gogh’s last words were, “The sadness will last forever.” Vincent van Gogh was 37 years old."
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November 26, 2022 - November 26, 2022.
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Chapter 9. After van Gogh’s Suicide
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"“Life itself, too, is forever turning an infinitely vacant, dispiriting blank side towards man on which nothing appears, any more than it does on a blank canvas. But no matter how vacant and vain, how dead life may appear to be, the man of faith, of energy, of warmth, who knows something, will not be put off so easily.”
"—Vincent van Gogh"
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"Van Gogh’s funeral took place the day after his death on July 30, 1890. Theo carried out the difficult tasks of completing his brother’s death certification documents at Auvers Town Hall before sending out invitations to the funeral to all of their friends. Theo wanted as many people as possible to attend van Gogh’s funeral despite the short notice and included the Paris to Auvers train timetable as encouragement.
"Theo had van Gogh’s body set out in his room at the Auberge-Ravoux guest house and surrounded him with his most recent canvasses and swathes of yellow flowers, Vincent’s favorite. The paint on many of the canvasses was still wet. His easel, folding stool, and painting supplies were displayed alongside his coffin. Friends and family arrived to view van Gogh’s body, and Dr. Gachet took the opportunity to sketch Vincent’s face on his deathbed.
"Many of van Gogh’s friends attended his funeral, including Pere Tanguy, Lucien Pissarro, Auguste Lauzet, and Emile Bernard. Gauguin, who declined to attend the funeral, wrote later in a note to a friend, “perhaps there is something to be learned from the dreadful business of van Gogh.” A hearse arrived at the Auberge-Ravoux in the afternoon and carried van Gogh’s coffin to the cemetery, which was located on a little hill above the wheat fields. The funeral party followed the hearse on foot. Dr. Gachet managed to say a few words at the funeral as Theo was too overcome with emotion. Suppressing his own bitter tears, Gachet praised van Gogh as an honest man and a great artist with only two aims, “art and humanity.”
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"After van Gogh’s death, Theo poured all his grief into organizing a retrospective of his brother’s work. Initially, Theo wanted the art dealer Paul Durand-Ruel to handle the retrospective, but Durand-Ruel was close to bankruptcy and could not afford to lend his gallery to a memorial exhibition that might not make any money. Octave Maus and Paul Signac stepped in and offered their support. As well as a large exhibition, Theo wanted to create a large catalog of van Gogh’s work into which he would insert some of the thousands of letters he and his brothers had exchanged.
"Unbeknownst to most, perhaps even to Vincent, Theo himself had been ill in the months leading up to his brother’s suicide. With the stress of van Gogh’s death, his own lack of employment, and the exertion of putting together a large exhibition, Theo became gravely ill. In Paris, Theo was diagnosed as suffering from progressive paralysis, and in November 1890, he was admitted to a psychiatric hospital in Den Dolder, Utrecht. Theo’s symptoms were the product of long-term untreated syphilis and mental exhaustion. By December, Theo was diagnosed with dementia paralytica, known simply as “disease of the brain.” Less than six months after van Gogh’s death, on January 25, 1891, Theo van Gogh died. The cause of death was recorded as “heredity, chronic disease, overwork, sadness.”
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"Friends of Vincent and Theo who had promised to exhibit van Gogh’s work kept their word. Memorial exhibitions were held in Brussels, Paris, The Hague, and Antwerp, and ten of van Gogh’s paintings were shown at the Salon des Independants in 1891 where they were the most admired works in the show. This show marked the start of van Gogh’s posthumous fame. Aurier, who had first introduced the European art world to van Gogh’s work with his 1890 article “Unknown Painters: Vincent Van Gogh,” continued to write about van Gogh after his death. Emile Bernard also wrote on van Gogh’s unrecognized talent while his tragically short and tormented life provided captivating material for authors. A 1924 novel by Louis Pierard, titled Le vie traqigue de Vincent van Gogh (The Tragic Life of Vincent van Gogh) was a roaring success and later translated into seven languages.
"On Theo’s death, his widow Jo van Gogh suddenly became responsible for Theo’s extensive art collection and van Gogh’s enormous body of work that included several hundred paintings and drawings and a huge collection of letters. Jo had only known Theo for a short time before they were married and had met van Gogh only a handful of times. She also had a newborn baby she now had to raise alone.
"Yet Jo was dedicated to doing what she could to preserve van Gogh’s legacy. Jo loaned his paintings to exhibitions all over the world, beginning with a small solo show in Paris in 1892. In 1901, the Bernheim-Jeune Gallery in Paris exhibited a van Gogh retrospective that is thought to have heavily influenced the development of the Fauvist approach to painting. Van Gogh’s work was also shown in Cologne in 1912, in New York in 1913, and in Berlin in 1914. His paintings’ perceived worth increased as art institutions began to recognize the power of his work and the influence he had on European art during his short but productive life.
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"In 1914, Jo published a volume of van Gogh’s letters to Theo, intensifying the public’s fascination with the man Arles villagers had called le fou roux (the red-headed madman). On Jo’s death in 1925, her huge collection of paintings by van Gogh and his contemporaries passed to her son, Vincent Willem van Gogh. Vincent allowed a huge loan of his uncle’s paintings to the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam in 1930, and as the decades passed and van Gogh’s fame continued to grow, the people of the Netherlands pressured the government to create a dedicated public museum for the work of their most famous son.
"In 1973, eleven years after the establishment of the Vincent van Gogh Foundation, the Van Gogh Museum finally opened in Amsterdam. Queen Juliana of the Netherlands opened the museum, which operates with the promise that van Gogh’s collection will be accessible to everyone, forever. Today, the Van Gogh Museum welcomes over two million visitors from all parts of the world every year."
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November 26, 2022 - November 27, 2022.
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Conclusion
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"Van Gogh moved often, from The Hague to Paris, then to Arles, Saint-Remy, and finally, Auvers-sur-Oise. He befriended artists wherever he went, and although he preferred to live far from the urban sprawl in the countryside, his constant correspondence with Theo kept him up to date on artistic developments in Paris. Van Gogh did not work in a vacuum, and it was his most ambitious dream to develop an artists’ commune where he could work with other painters to push the boundaries of art. Sadly, this dream was never realized, and van Gogh was forced to occupy the role of a solitary genius, even as he perished in loneliness.
"Van Gogh followed the developments in Paris but pushed back against a move towards abstraction and symbolism. For him, the purest definition of the art was, “L’art c’est l’homme ajoute a la nature” (art is man added to nature). Vincent van Gogh was faithful to nature and sought only to represent that which he could see. Far from being a realist, he looked for meaning in the natural world and used his paintings to express the emotion he found there. Using color as a vehicle for sensation and brushwork as a means of expression, van Gogh searched for emotional authenticity in representation.
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"In 1888, van Gogh wrote, “I cannot invent my painting completely, on the contrary I find it already in nature, all I have to do is to succeed in recognizing its presence there.”"
"The evolution of van Gogh’s artistic oeuvre happened at lightning speed with thunderous intensity. Only five years elapsed between van Gogh’s painting of what he considered his first masterpiece,The Potato Eaters and his last painting, Wheatfield with Crows. The art world had no hope of keeping up with his output or recognizing his talent in real time. It became the work of subsequent generations to find the true meaning of Vincent van Gogh’s work, to locate the humanity in his swirls of paint on canvas."
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November 27, 2022 - November 27, 2022.
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VINCENT VAN GOGH: A LIFE
FROM BEGINNING TO END
(BIOGRAPHIES OF PAINTERS)
by HOURLY HISTORY.
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November 24, 2022 - November 27, 2022.
Purchased November 23, 2022.
ASIN:- B07BFW6M1G
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https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/5121522871
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