Как правильно написать ван гог

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Уважаемая Грамота! Почему мы пишем Ван Гог без дефиса, а Ван-Дейк через дефис? Буду благодарна за ответ.

Ответ справочной службы русского языка

Оба имени пишутся раздельно.

Словарь имён собственных

ВАН ДЕЙК Антонис, Ван Дейка Антониса [дэ]

ВАН ГОГ Винсент, Ван Гога Винсента [сэ] (голл. художник)

Господа, подскажите, пожалуйста, как писать частицу «-то» в таком случае? А ты «Мертвые души-то» читал? А ты «Мертвые души»-то читал?

Ответ справочной службы русского языка

Рекомендаций для подобных случаев в справочниках по правописанию пока нет. Из предложенных Вами вариантов лучше второй. Он выглядит диковинно, но не искажает названия, как в первом варианте. Однако более предпочтительным представляется написание без знака препинания: А ты «Мертвые души» то читал?  Когда приставка или часть сложного слова, требующая слитного написания, присоединяется к словосочетанию, она пишется раздельно. Ср.: лже доктор наук, псевдо произведение искусства, теле круглый стол, мини стиральная машина; экс Советский Союз, псевдо Ван Гог, пол рабочего дня, пол столовой ложки, пол Московской области. Это правило можно распространить и на написание постфикса то, присоединяемого к словосочетанию. 

Спасибо за очень интересный вопрос. Мы передадим его в Орфографическую комиссию РАН.

Здравствуйте, уважаемые сотрудники «Грамоты.ру»! В процессе вычитки монографии о взаимодействии колеса и рельса столкнулась с непростым случаем. Помогите, пожалуйста, разобраться: как следует написать словосочетание _чудо смазочный материал_? Смущает то, что приложение относится к сочетанию слов, а не к одному слову. В «Справочнике по правописанию и литературной правке» Д. Э. Розенталя подобного случая, к сожалению, не нашла. Замена на _чудо-смазку_ нежелательна, т. к. авторы по определенным причинам не употребляют слово «смазка» в своей работе. Заранее благодарна вам за ответ и спасибо за вашу непростую работу! С уважением, Любовь

Ответ справочной службы русского языка

Правильно раздельное написание. Оно соответствует следующему правилу.

Недопустимо слитное или дефисное написание с приставкой или первой частью сложного слова, если вторая часть содержит пробел, т. е. представляет собой сочетание слов. В этих случаях слитные или дефисные написания, рекомендуемые основными правилами, должны заменяться раздельными. Например, следует писать: лже доктор наук, псевдо произведение искусства, теле круглый стол, мини стиральная машина; экс Советский Союз, псевдо Ван Гог, пол рабочего дня, пол столовой ложки, пол Московской области (Правила русской орфографии и пунктуации. Полный академический справочник / Под ред. В. В. Лопатина. М., 2006. § 153).

Спасибо за ответ про «экс»! А «экс начальник управления» и «экс директор программы» тоже можно писать по-разному? И какой вариант предпочесть? Спасибо!

Ответ справочной службы русского языка

Нужно писать раздельно. Вот общее правило на этот счет:

«Недопустимо слитное или дефисное написание с приставкой или первой частью сложного слова, если вторая часть содержит пробел, т. е. представляет собой сочетание слов. В этих случаях слитные или дефисные написания, рекомендуемые основными правилами, должны заменяться раздельными. Например, следует писать: лже доктор наук, псевдо произведение искусства, теле круглый стол, мини стиральная машина; экс Советский Союз, псевдо Ван Гог, пол рабочего дня, пол столовой ложки, пол Московской области; то же в парных конструкциях с полу: полудеревни — полу дачные посёлки, полусанаторий — полу дом отдыха, полупародия — полу литературный фельетон, полуясли — полу детский сад«.

Добрый день! Подскажите, пожалуйста, как писать лже крымское шампанское? И есть ли какое-то правило на этот случай, когда приставка «лже-» относится к двум словам?

Ответ справочной службы русского языка

Да, такие правила существуют. Они называются правилами координации. Вот выдержка из этих правил.

Недопустимо слитное или дефисное написание с приставкой или первой частью сложного слова, если вторая часть содержит пробел, т. е. представляет собой сочетание слов. В этих случаях слитные или дефисные написания, рекомендуемые основными правилами, должны заменяться раздельными. Например, следует писать: лже доктор наук, псевдо произведение искусства, теле круглый стол, мини стиральная машина; экс Советский Союз, псевдо Ван Гог, пол рабочего дня, пол столовой ложки, пол Московской области. (Правила русской орфографии и пунктуации. Полный академический справочник / Под ред. В. В. Лопатина. М., 2006.)

Однако сочетание (лже) крымское шампанское может быть понято двояко и, соответственно, иметь разные написания. Лже крымское шампанское – это какой-то напиток, выдаваемый за крымское шампанское (лже + крымское шампанское), лжекрымское шампанское – это шампанское, которое сделано не в Крыму, но выдается за крымское.

Как в именном указателе помещать людей с фамилиями: ван Ховен, Ди Каприо, Де Агостини, фон Лилиенфель? На букву «основной» фамилии: Агостини, де? Ховен, ван? или все же начинать надо с частицы?

Ответ справочной службы русского языка

Служебные элементы (артикли, предлоги) ван, да, де, ле и т. п., входящие в состав иноязычной фамилии, могут быть ее неотъемлемой частью, и обычно в этих случаях мы не употребляем фамилию без служебного элемента. Ср.: мы говорим Ван Гог (не Гог), Ди Каприо (не Каприо), Де Костер (не Костер). Но при этом обычно употребляют: Бальзак (не де Бальзак), Бетховен (не ван Бетховен). 

Это различие сказывается, как Вы, наверное, обратили внимание, и на написании. Служебные элементы, входящие в состав иноязычных фамилий, обычно пишутся со строчной буквы: Людвиг ван Бетховен, Оноре де Бальзак, Гёц фон Берлихинген. Однако если служебный элемент «спаян» с фамилией, он пишется с прописной буквы: Ван Гог, Шарль Де Костер, Леонардо Ди Каприо.

От «спаянности» служебного элемента с фамилией (и, соответственно, написания его с прописной или строчной буквы) зависит и алфавитный порядок. Например, в «Словаре собственных имен русского языка» Ф. Л. Агеенко: БАЛЬЗАК Оноре де, БЕРЛИХИНГЕН Гёц фон, БЕТХОВЕН Людвиг ван – на букву Б; но: ВАН ГОГ Винсент – на букву В, ДЕ КОСТЕР Шарль и ДИ КАПРИО Леонардо – на букву Д.

Меня интересует написание имени восточного философа Аль-Фараби. В одних источниках его имя дается по аналогии написания всех арабских имен с приставкой «аль», то есть со сточной буквы. В других — как закрепившееся в виде исключения из общего правила, как-то: Ибн-Сина, Ван Гог и т.д. Как все же правильно и где можно уточнить написание?

Ответ справочной службы русского языка

Рекомендация «Словаря имен собственных» Ф. Л. Агеенко: аль-Фараби.

Как правильно: Ван Гог или Ван-Гог (второй вариант в справочнике Розенталя)?

Ответ справочной службы русского языка

Корректно написание с пробелом: Ван Гог.

здравствуйте, наткнулась на заголовок : «Ван Гог, самоубитый обществом»

слово «самоубитый» очень напрягает, есть ли вообще такое слово в русском языке и насколько оно здесь уместно. Какие аналоги можно подобрать к этому? Понимаю, что «доведенный до самоубийства обществом» было бы правильнее, но менее выразительно

Ответ справочной службы русского языка

В русском литературном языке такого слова нет. Это окказионализм, результат индивидуального словотворчества. Именно за счет своей необычности такие слова и обладают повышенной выразительностью. Использование окказионализмов не редкость в литературно-художественной и публицистической речи.

Здравствуйте! Как объяснить различное написание артикля или предлога(?) «ВАН» в именах: Людвиг ван Бетховен и Клод Ван Дам? А может, нужно одинаково, со строчной?

Ответ справочной службы русского языка

Служебный элемент ван обычно пишется со строчной буквы, написание Людвиг ван Бетховен соответствует правилу. Однако в некоторых личных именах компонент ван может быть написан с прописной буквы (такое орфографическое оформление часто соответствует написанию с прописной в языке-источнике и проверяется в словарном порядке): Ван Гог, Ван Дамм.

Здравствуйте! Помогите, пожалуйста, разобраться. Как правильно пишутся нидерландские фамилии типа Ван (ван ?) Бастен? Есть ли общее правило для их написания? А то у нас в газете принято писать Винсент Ван Гог, но Тео ван Гог (режиссер). Помогите разобраться!

Ответ справочной службы русского языка

См. ответ № 239351.

Скажите, пожалуйста, как пишется частица «ван» в голландских (фламандских) фамилиях: с прописной или строчной буквы? Или возможно и то, и другое написание?
Для примера: Людвиг ван Бетховен (со строчной). Но: Жан-Клод Ван Дамм (хотя это, кажется, псевдоним).
Мне думается, правильнее писать «ван» со строчной — как немецкое «фон» (оно всегда пишется со строчной).
Спасибо.

Ответ справочной службы русского языка

Служебный элемент ван обычно пишется со строчной буквы: Людвиг ван Бетховен. Однако в некоторых личных именах компонент ван может быть написан с прописной буквы (такое орфографическое оформление часто соответствует написанию с прописной в языке-источнике и проверяется в словарном порядке): Ван Гог, Ван Дамм. 

Подскажите,пожалуйста,как правильно пишутся на русском языке иностранные голландские фамилии с такими составными частями как van или de.Например,Pieter van Vuuren,Nick van de Vert — Питер ван Вююрен или Питер Ван Вююрен и Ник ван де Верт или Ник Ван Де Верт?

Заранее спасибо

Ответ справочной службы русского языка

Общее правило таково: служебные слова, входящие в состав западноевропейских фамилий, пишутся со строчной буквы (ван, де, делла и т. п.). Однако есть исключения: Ван Гог, Ван Дамм.

Здравствуйте, скажите, пожалуйста, в каких случаях слово «де» в начале иностранных фамилий пишется со строчной, а в каких — с заглавной буквы. Спасибо.

Ответ справочной службы русского языка

Служебные элементы (артикли, предлоги) ван, да, де, ле и т. п., входящие в состав иноязычных фамилий, пишутся со строчной буквы: Р. ле Вин; Т. де Фрэнк; K. ван Вормер. С прописной буквы эти элементы пишутся по традиции лишь в некоторых личных именах (Ван Гог, Шарль Де Костер). Проверять следует по орфографическому словарю.

Vincent van Gogh
Self-Portrait, 1887, Art Institute of Chicago
Born	Vincent Willem van Gogh 30 March 1853 Zundert, Netherlands
Died	29 July 1890 (aged 37) Auvers-sur-Oise, France
Cause of death	Gunshot wound
Resting place	Cimetière d’Auvers-sur-Oise, France 49°04′31″N 2°10′44″E / 49.07531°N 2.17894°E
Education	Royal Academy of Fine Arts Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts
Known for	Painting, drawing still life, portraits and landscapes
Notable work	The Potato Eaters (1885) Sunflowers (1887) Bedroom in Arles (1888) The Starry Night (1889) Portrait of Dr. Gachet (1890) Wheatfield with Crows (1890) The Siesta (1890) Church at Auvers (1890) Sorrowing Old Man (1890)
Movement	Post-Impressionism
Family	Theodorus van Gogh (brother)

Vincent Willem van Gogh (Dutch: [ˈvɪnsɛnt ˈʋɪləm vɑŋ ˈɣɔx] (listen);^{[note 1]} 30 March 1853 – 29 July 1890) was a Dutch Post-Impressionist painter who posthumously became one of the most famous and influential figures in Western art history. In a decade, he created about 2,100 artworks, including around 860 oil paintings, most of which date from the last two years of his life. They include landscapes, still lifes, portraits and self-portraits, and are characterised by bold colours and dramatic, impulsive and expressive brushwork that contributed to the foundations of modern art. Not commercially successful, he struggled with severe depression and poverty, eventually leading to his suicide at age thirty-seven.

Born into an upper-middle class family, Van Gogh drew as a child and was serious, quiet, and thoughtful. As a young man, he worked as an art dealer, often traveling, but became depressed after he was transferred to London. He turned to religion and spent time as a Protestant missionary in southern Belgium. He drifted in ill health and solitude before taking up painting in 1881, having moved back home with his parents. His younger brother Theo supported him financially; the two kept a long correspondence by letter. His early works, mostly still lifes and depictions of peasant labourers, contain few signs of the vivid colour that distinguished his later work. In 1886, he moved to Paris, where he met members of the avant-garde, including Émile Bernard and Paul Gauguin, who were reacting against the Impressionist sensibility. As his work developed he created a new approach to still lifes and local landscapes. His paintings grew brighter as he developed a style that became fully realised during his stay in Arles in the South of France in 1888. During this period he broadened his subject matter to include series of olive trees, wheat fields and sunflowers.

Van Gogh suffered from psychotic episodes and delusions and though he worried about his mental stability, he often neglected his physical health, did not eat properly and drank heavily. His friendship with Gauguin ended after a confrontation with a razor when, in a rage, he severed part of his own left ear. He spent time in psychiatric hospitals, including a period at Saint-Rémy. After he discharged himself and moved to the Auberge Ravoux in Auvers-sur-Oise near Paris, he came under the care of the homeopathic doctor Paul Gachet. His depression persisted, and on 27 July 1890, Van Gogh is believed to have shot himself in the chest with a revolver, dying from his injuries two days later.

Van Gogh was commercially unsuccessful during his lifetime, and he was considered a madman and a failure. As he only became famous after his suicide, he came to be seen as a misunderstood genius in the public imagination.^[6] His reputation grew in the early 20th century as elements of his style came to be incorporated by the Fauves and German Expressionists. He attained widespread critical and commercial success over the ensuing decades, and is remembered as an important but tragic painter whose troubled personality typifies the romantic ideal of the tortured artist. Today, Van Gogh’s works are among the world’s most expensive paintings to have ever sold, and his legacy is honoured by a museum in his name, the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, which holds the world’s largest collection of his paintings and drawings.

Letters

The most comprehensive primary source on Van Gogh is the correspondence between him and his younger brother, Theo. Their lifelong friendship, and most of what is known of Vincent’s thoughts and theories of art, are recorded in the hundreds of letters they exchanged from 1872 until 1890.^[7] Theo van Gogh was an art dealer and provided his brother with financial and emotional support as well as access to influential people on the contemporary art scene.^[8]

Theo kept all of Vincent’s letters to him;^[10] but Vincent kept only few of the letters he received. After both had died, Theo’s widow Jo Bonger-van Gogh arranged for the publication of some of their letters. A few appeared in 1906 and 1913; the majority were published in 1914.^[11][12] Vincent’s letters are eloquent and expressive and have been described as having a «diary-like intimacy»,^[8] and read in parts like autobiography.^[8] Translator Arnold Pomerans wrote that their publication adds a «fresh dimension to the understanding of Van Gogh’s artistic achievement, an understanding granted to us by virtually no other painter».^[13]

There are more than 600 letters from Vincent to Theo and around 40 from Theo to Vincent. There are 22 to his sister Wil, 58 to the painter Anthon van Rappard, 22 to Émile Bernard as well as individual letters to Paul Signac, Paul Gauguin, and the critic Albert Aurier. Some are illustrated with sketches.^[8] Many are undated, but art historians have been able to place most in chronological order. Problems in transcription and dating remain, mainly with those posted from Arles. While there, Vincent wrote around 200 letters in Dutch, French, and English.^[14] There is a gap in the record when he lived in Paris as the brothers lived together and had no need to correspond.^[15]

The highly paid contemporary artist Jules Breton was frequently mentioned in Vincent’s letters. In 1875 letters to Theo, Vincent mentions he saw Breton, discusses the Breton paintings he saw at a Salon, and discusses sending one of Breton’s books but only on the condition that it be returned.^[16][17] In a March 1884 letter to Rappard he discusses one of Breton’s poems that had inspired one of his own paintings.^[18] In 1885 he describes Breton’s famous work The Song of the Lark as being «fine».^[19] In March 1880, roughly midway between these letters, Van Gogh set out on an 80-kilometre trip on foot to meet with Breton in the village of Courrières; however, he was apparently intimidated by Breton’s success and/or the high wall around his estate. He turned around and returned without making his presence known.^[20][21][22] It appears Breton was unaware of Van Gogh or his attempted visit. There are no known letters between the two artists and Van Gogh is not one of the contemporary artists discussed by Breton in his 1891 autobiography Life of an Artist.

Life

Early years

Vincent Willem van Gogh was born on 30 March 1853 in Groot-Zundert, in the predominantly Catholic province of North Brabant in the Netherlands.^[23] He was the oldest surviving child of Theodorus van Gogh (1822–1885), a minister of the Dutch Reformed Church, and his wife, Anna Cornelia Carbentus (1819–1907). Van Gogh was given the name of his grandfather and of a brother stillborn exactly a year before his birth.^{[note 2]} Vincent was a common name in the Van Gogh family. The name had been borne by his grandfather, the prominent art dealer Vincent (1789–1874), and a theology graduate at the University of Leiden in 1811. This Vincent had six sons, three of whom became art dealers, and may have been named after his own great-uncle, a sculptor (1729–1802).^[25]

Van Gogh’s mother came from a prosperous family in The Hague,^[26] and his father was the youngest son of a minister.^[27] The two met when Anna’s younger sister, Cornelia, married Theodorus’s older brother Vincent (Cent). Van Gogh’s parents married in May 1851, and moved to Zundert.^[28] His brother Theo was born on 1 May 1857. There was another brother, Cor, and three sisters: Elisabeth, Anna, and Willemina (known as «Wil»). In later life, Van Gogh remained in touch only with Willemina and Theo.^[29] Van Gogh’s mother was a rigid and religious woman who emphasized the importance of family to the point of for those around her.^[30] Theodorus’s salary as a minister was modest, but the Church also supplied the family with a house, a maid, two cooks, a gardener, a carriage and horse; his mother Anna instilled in the children a duty to uphold the family’s high social position.^[31]

Van Gogh was a serious and thoughtful child.^[32] He was taught at home by his mother and a governess, and in 1860, was sent to the village school. In 1864, he was placed in a boarding school at Zevenbergen,^[33] where he felt abandoned, and he campaigned to come home. Instead, in 1866, his parents sent him to the middle school in Tilburg, where he was also deeply unhappy.^[34] His interest in art began at a young age. He was encouraged to draw as a child by his mother,^[35] and his early drawings are expressive,^[33] but do not approach the intensity of his later work.^[36] Constant Cornelis Huijsmans, who had been a successful artist in Paris, taught the students at Tilburg. His philosophy was to reject technique in favour of capturing the impressions of things, particularly nature or common objects. Van Gogh’s profound unhappiness seems to have overshadowed the lessons, which had little effect.^[37] In March 1868, he abruptly returned home. He later wrote that his youth was «austere and cold, and sterile».^[38]

In July 1869, Van Gogh’s uncle Cent obtained a position for him at the art dealers Goupil & Cie in The Hague.^[39] After completing his training in 1873, he was transferred to Goupil’s London branch on Southampton Street, and took lodgings at 87 Hackford Road, Stockwell.^[40] This was a happy time for Van Gogh; he was successful at work and, at 20, was earning more than his father. Theo’s wife, Jo Van Gogh-Bonger, later remarked that this was the best year of Vincent’s life. He became infatuated with his landlady’s daughter, Eugénie Loyer, but she rejected him after confessing his feelings; she was secretly engaged to a former lodger. He grew more isolated and religiously fervent. His father and uncle arranged a transfer to Paris in 1875, where he became resentful of issues such as the degree to which the art dealers commodified art, and he was dismissed a year later.^[41]

In April 1876, he returned to England to take unpaid work as a supply teacher in a small boarding school in Ramsgate. When the proprietor moved to Isleworth in Middlesex, Van Gogh went with him.^[42][43] The arrangement was not successful; he left to become a Methodist minister’s assistant.^[44] His parents had meanwhile moved to Etten;^[45] in 1876 he returned home at Christmas for six months and took work at a bookshop in Dordrecht. He was unhappy in the position and spent his time doodling or translating passages from the Bible into English, French, and German.^[46] He immersed himself in Christianity, and became increasingly pious and monastic.^[47] According to his flatmate of the time, Paulus van Görlitz, Van Gogh ate frugally, avoiding meat.^[48]

To support his religious conviction and his desire to become a pastor, in 1877, the family sent him to live with his uncle Johannes Stricker, a respected theologian, in Amsterdam.^[49] Van Gogh prepared for the University of Amsterdam theology entrance examination;^[50] he failed the exam and left his uncle’s house in July 1878. He undertook, but also failed, a three-month course at a Protestant missionary school in Laken, near Brussels.^[51]

In January 1879, he took up a post as a missionary at Petit-Wasmes^[52] in the working class, coal-mining district of Borinage in Belgium. To show support for his impoverished congregation, he gave up his comfortable lodgings at a bakery to a homeless person and moved to a small hut, where he slept on straw.^[53] His humble living conditions did not endear him to church authorities, who dismissed him for «undermining the dignity of the priesthood». He then walked the 75 kilometres (47 mi) to Brussels,^[54] returned briefly to Cuesmes in the Borinage, but he gave in to pressure from his parents to return home to Etten. He stayed there until around March 1880,^{[note 3]} which caused concern and frustration for his parents. His father was especially frustrated and advised that his son be committed to the lunatic asylum in Geel.^{[56][57][note 4]}

Van Gogh returned to Cuesmes in August 1880, where he lodged with a miner until October.^[59] He became interested in the people and scenes around him, and he recorded them in drawings after Theo’s suggestion that he take up art in earnest. He traveled to Brussels later in the year, to follow Theo’s recommendation that he study with the Dutch artist Willem Roelofs, who persuaded him – in spite of his dislike of formal schools of art – to attend the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts. He registered at the Académie in November 1880, where he studied anatomy and the standard rules of modelling and perspective.^[60]

Etten, Drenthe and The Hague

Van Gogh returned to Etten in April 1881 for an extended stay with his parents.^[61] He continued to draw, often using his neighbours as subjects. In August 1881, his recently widowed cousin, Cornelia «Kee» Vos-Stricker, daughter of his mother’s older sister Willemina and Johannes Stricker, arrived for a visit. He was thrilled and took long walks with her. Kee was seven years older than he was and had an eight-year-old son. Van Gogh surprised everyone by declaring his love to her and proposing marriage.^[62] She refused with the words «No, nay, never» («nooit, neen, nimmer«).^[63] After Kee returned to Amsterdam, Van Gogh went to The Hague to try to sell paintings and to meet with his second cousin, Anton Mauve. Mauve was the successful artist Van Gogh longed to be.^[64] Mauve invited him to return in a few months and suggested he spend the intervening time working in charcoal and pastels; Van Gogh returned to Etten and followed this advice.^[64]

Late in November 1881, Van Gogh wrote a letter to Johannes Stricker, one which he described to Theo as an attack.^[65] Within days he left for Amsterdam.^[66] Kee would not meet him, and her parents wrote that his «persistence is disgusting«.^[67] In despair, he held his left hand in the flame of a lamp, with the words: «Let me see her for as long as I can keep my hand in the flame.»^[67][68] He did not recall the event well, but later assumed that his uncle had blown out the flame. Kee’s father made it clear that her refusal should be heeded and that the two would not marry, largely because of Van Gogh’s inability to support himself.^[69]

Mauve took Van Gogh on as a student and introduced him to watercolour, which he worked on for the next month before returning home for Christmas.^[70] He quarrelled with his father, refusing to attend church, and left for The Hague.^{[note 5][71]} In January 1882, Mauve introduced him to painting in oil and lent him money to set up a studio.^[72][73] Within a month Van Gogh and Mauve fell out, possibly over the viability of drawing from plaster casts.^[74] Van Gogh could afford to hire only people from the street as models, a practice of which Mauve seems to have disapproved.^[75] In June Van Gogh suffered a bout of gonorrhoea and spent three weeks in hospital.^[76] Soon after, he first painted in oils,^[77] bought with money borrowed from Theo. He liked the medium, and he spread the paint liberally, scraping from the canvas and working back with the brush. He wrote that he was surprised at how good the results were.^[78]

By March 1882, Mauve appeared to have gone cold towards Van Gogh, and he stopped replying to his letters.^[79] He had learned of Van Gogh’s new domestic arrangement with an alcoholic prostitute, Clasina Maria «Sien» Hoornik (1850–1904), and her young daughter.^[80] Van Gogh had met Sien towards the end of January 1882, when she had a five-year-old daughter and was pregnant. She had previously borne two children who died, but Van Gogh was unaware of this.^[81] On 2 July, she gave birth to a baby boy, Willem.^[82] When Van Gogh’s father discovered the details of their relationship, he put pressure on his son to abandon Sien and her two children. Vincent at first defied him,^[83] and considered moving the family out of the city, but in late 1883, he left Sien and the children.^[84]

Poverty may have pushed Sien back into prostitution; the home became less happy and Van Gogh may have felt family life was irreconcilable with his artistic development. Sien gave her daughter to her mother and baby Willem to her brother.^[85] Willem remembered visiting Rotterdam when he was about 12, when an uncle tried to persuade Sien to marry to legitimise the child.^[86] He believed Van Gogh was his father, but the timing of his birth makes this unlikely.^[87] Sien drowned herself in the River Scheldt in 1904.^[88]

In September 1883, Van Gogh moved to Drenthe in the northern Netherlands. In December driven by loneliness, he went to live with his parents, then in Nuenen, North Brabant.^[88]

Emerging artist

Nuenen and Antwerp (1883–1886)

In Nuenen, Van Gogh focused on painting and drawing. Working outside and very quickly, he completed sketches and paintings of weavers and their cottages. Van Gogh also completed The Parsonage Garden at Nuenen, which was stolen from the Singer Laren in March 2020.^[89][90] From August 1884, Margot Begemann, a neighbour’s daughter ten years his senior, joined him on his forays; she fell in love and he reciprocated, though less enthusiastically. They wanted to marry, but neither side of their families were in favour. Margot was distraught and took an overdose of strychnine, but survived after Van Gogh rushed her to a nearby hospital.^[82] On 26 March 1885, his father died of a heart attack.^[91]

Van Gogh painted several groups of still lifes in 1885.^[92] During his two-year stay in Nuenen, he completed numerous drawings and watercolours and nearly 200 oil paintings. His palette consisted mainly of sombre earth tones, particularly dark brown, and showed no sign of the vivid colours that distinguished his later work.^[93]

There was interest from a dealer in Paris early in 1885.^[94] Theo asked Vincent if he had paintings ready to exhibit.^[95] In May, Van Gogh responded with his first major work, The Potato Eaters, and a series of «peasant character studies» which were the culmination of several years of work.^[96] When he complained that Theo was not making enough effort to sell his paintings in Paris, his brother responded that they were too dark and not in keeping with the bright style of Impressionism.^[93] In August his work was publicly exhibited for the first time, in the shop windows of the dealer Leurs in The Hague. One of his young peasant sitters became pregnant in September 1885; Van Gogh was accused of forcing himself upon her, and the village priest forbade parishioners to model for him.^[97]

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  Worn Out, pencil on watercolour paper, 1882. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam^[98]

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He moved to Antwerp that November and rented a room above a paint dealer’s shop in the rue des Images (Lange Beeldekensstraat).^[99] He lived in poverty and ate poorly, preferring to spend the money Theo sent on painting materials and models. Bread, coffee and tobacco became his staple diet. In February 1886, he wrote to Theo that he could only remember eating six hot meals since the previous May. His teeth became loose and painful.^[100] In Antwerp he applied himself to the study of colour theory and spent time in museums—particularly studying the work of Peter Paul Rubens—and broadened his palette to include carmine, cobalt blue and emerald green. Van Gogh bought Japanese ukiyo-e woodcuts in the docklands, later incorporating elements of their style into the background of some of his paintings.^[101] He was drinking heavily again,^[102] and was hospitalised between February and March 1886,^[103] when he was possibly also treated for syphilis.^{[104][note 6]}

After his recovery, despite his antipathy towards academic teaching, he took the higher-level admission exams at the Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp and, in January 1886, matriculated in painting and drawing. He became ill and run down by overwork, poor diet and excessive smoking.^[107] He started to attend drawing classes after plaster models at the Antwerp Academy on 18 January 1886. He quickly got into trouble with Charles Verlat, the director of the academy and teacher of a painting class, because of his unconventional painting style. Van Gogh had also clashed with the instructor of the drawing class Franz Vinck. Van Gogh finally started to attend the drawing classes after antique plaster models given by Eugène Siberdt. Soon Siberdt and Van Gogh came into conflict when the latter did not comply with Siberdt’s requirement that drawings express the contour and concentrate on the line. When Van Gogh was required to draw the Venus de Milo during a drawing class, he produced the limbless, naked torso of a Flemish peasant woman. Siberdt regarded this as defiance against his artistic guidance and made corrections to Van Gogh’s drawing with his crayon so vigorously that he tore the paper. Van Gogh then flew into a violent rage and shouted at Siberdt: ‘You clearly do not know what a young woman is like, God damn it! A woman must have hips, buttocks, a pelvis in which she can carry a baby!’ According to some accounts, this was the last time Van Gogh attended classes at the academy and he left later for Paris.^[108] On 31 March 1886, which was about a month after the confrontation with Siberdt, the teachers of the academy decided that 17 students, including Van Gogh, had to repeat a year. The story that Van Gogh was expelled from the academy by Siberdt is therefore unfounded.^[109]

Paris (1886–1888)

Van Gogh moved to Paris in March 1886 where he shared Theo’s rue Laval apartment in Montmartre and studied at Fernand Cormon’s studio. In June the brothers took a larger flat at 54 rue Lepic.^[111] In Paris, Vincent painted portraits of friends and acquaintances, still life paintings, views of Le Moulin de la Galette, scenes in Montmartre, Asnières and along the Seine. In 1885 in Antwerp he had become interested in Japanese ukiyo-e woodblock prints and had used them to decorate the walls of his studio; while in Paris he collected hundreds of them. He tried his hand at Japonaiserie, tracing a figure from a reproduction on the cover of the magazine Paris Illustre, The Courtesan or Oiran (1887), after Keisai Eisen, which he then graphically enlarged in a painting.^[112]

After seeing the portrait of Adolphe Monticelli at the Galerie Delareybarette, Van Gogh adopted a brighter palette and a bolder attack, particularly in paintings such as his Seascape at Saintes-Maries (1888).^[113][114] Two years later, Vincent and Theo paid for the publication of a book on Monticelli paintings, and Vincent bought some of Monticelli’s works to add to his collection.^[115]

Van Gogh learned about Fernand Cormon’s atelier from Theo.^[116] He worked at the studio in April and May 1886,^[117] where he frequented the circle of the Australian artist John Russell, who painted his portrait in 1886.^[118] Van Gogh also met fellow students Émile Bernard, Louis Anquetin and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec – who painted a portrait of him in pastel. They met at Julien «Père» Tanguy’s paint shop,^[117] (which was, at that time, the only place where Paul Cézanne’s paintings were displayed). In 1886, two large exhibitions were staged there, showing Pointillism and Neo-impressionism for the first time and bringing attention to Georges Seurat and Paul Signac. Theo kept a stock of Impressionist paintings in his gallery on boulevard Montmartre, but Van Gogh was slow to acknowledge the new developments in art.^[119]

Conflicts arose between the brothers. At the end of 1886 Theo found living with Vincent to be «almost unbearable».^[117] By early 1887, they were again at peace, and Vincent had moved to Asnières, a northwestern suburb of Paris, where he got to know Signac. He adopted elements of Pointillism, a technique in which a multitude of small coloured dots are applied to the canvas so that when seen from a distance they create an optical blend of hues. The style stresses the ability of complementary colours – including blue and orange – to form vibrant contrasts.^[95][117]

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  Courtesan (after Eisen), 1887. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

• 

While in Asnières Van Gogh painted parks, restaurants and the Seine, including Bridges across the Seine at Asnières. In November 1887, Theo and Vincent befriended Paul Gauguin who had just arrived in Paris.^[120] Towards the end of the year, Vincent arranged an exhibition alongside Bernard, Anquetin, and probably Toulouse-Lautrec, at the Grand-Bouillon Restaurant du Chalet, 43 avenue de Clichy, Montmartre. In a contemporary account, Bernard wrote that the exhibition was ahead of anything else in Paris.^[121] There, Bernard and Anquetin sold their first paintings, and Van Gogh exchanged work with Gauguin. Discussions on art, artists, and their social situations started during this exhibition, continued and expanded to include visitors to the show, like Camille Pissarro and his son Lucien, Signac and Seurat. In February 1888, feeling worn out from life in Paris, Van Gogh left, having painted more than 200 paintings during his two years there. Hours before his departure, accompanied by Theo, he paid his first and only visit to Seurat in his studio.^[122]

Artistic breakthrough

Arles (1888–89)

Ill from drink and suffering from smoker’s cough, in February 1888 Van Gogh sought refuge in Arles.^[14] He seems to have moved with thoughts of founding an art colony. The Danish artist Christian Mourier-Petersen became his companion for two months, and, at first, Arles appeared exotic. In a letter, he described it as a foreign country: «The Zouaves, the brothels, the adorable little Arlésienne going to her First Communion, the priest in his surplice, who looks like a dangerous rhinoceros, the people drinking absinthe, all seem to me creatures from another world.»^[123]

The time in Arles became one of Van Gogh’s more prolific periods: he completed 200 paintings and more than 100 drawings and watercolours.^[124] He was enchanted by the local countryside and light; his works from this period are rich in yellow, ultramarine and mauve. They include harvests, wheat fields and general rural landmarks from the area, including The Old Mill (1888), one of seven canvases sent to Pont-Aven on 4 October 1888 in an exchange of works with Paul Gauguin, Émile Bernard, Charles Laval and others.^[125]
The portrayals of Arles are informed by his Dutch upbringing; the patchworks of fields and avenues are flat and lacking perspective, but excel in their use of colour.^[126]

In March 1888 he painted landscapes using a gridded «perspective frame»; three of the works were shown at the annual exhibition of the Société des Artistes Indépendants. In April, he was visited by the American artist Dodge MacKnight, who was living nearby at Fontvieille.^[127][128] On 1 May 1888, for 15 francs per month, he signed a lease for the eastern wing of the Yellow House at 2 place Lamartine. The rooms were unfurnished and had been uninhabited for months.^[129]

On 7 May, Van Gogh moved from the Hôtel Carrel to the Café de la Gare,^[130] having befriended the proprietors, Joseph and Marie Ginoux. The Yellow House had to be furnished before he could fully move in, but he was able to use it as a studio.^[131] He wanted a gallery to display his work and started a series of paintings that eventually included Van Gogh’s Chair (1888), Bedroom in Arles (1888), The Night Café (1888), Café Terrace at Night (September 1888), Starry Night Over the Rhone (1888), and Still Life: Vase with Twelve Sunflowers (1888), all intended for the decoration for the Yellow House.^[132]

Van Gogh wrote that with The Night Café he tried «to express the idea that the café is a place where one can ruin oneself, go mad, or commit a crime».^[133] When he visited Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer in June, he gave lessons to a Zouave second lieutenant – Paul-Eugène Milliet^[134] – and painted boats on the sea and the village.^[135] MacKnight introduced Van Gogh to Eugène Boch, a Belgian painter who sometimes stayed in Fontvieille, and the two exchanged visits in July.^[134]

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  The Sower with Setting Sun, 1888. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

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  Fishing Boats on the Beach at Saintes-Maries, June 1888. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

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Gauguin’s visit (1888)

When Gauguin agreed to visit Arles in 1888, Van Gogh hoped for friendship and to realize his idea of an artists’ collective. Van Gogh prepared for Gauguin’s arrival by painting four versions of Sunflowers in one week.^[136] «In the hope of living in a studio of our own with Gauguin,» he wrote in a letter to Theo, «I’d like to do a decoration for the studio. Nothing but large Sunflowers.»^[137]

When Boch visited again, Van Gogh painted a portrait of him, as well as the study The Poet Against a Starry Sky.^{[138][note 7]}

In preparation for Gauguin’s visit, Van Gogh bought two beds on advice from the station’s postal supervisor Joseph Roulin, whose portrait he painted. On 17 September, he spent his first night in the still sparsely furnished Yellow House.^[140] When Gauguin consented to work and live in Arles with him, Van Gogh started to work on the Décoration for the Yellow House, probably the most ambitious effort he ever undertook.^[141] He completed two chair paintings: Van Gogh’s Chair and Gauguin’s Chair.^[142]

After much pleading from Van Gogh, Gauguin arrived in Arles on 23 October and, in November, the two painted together. Gauguin depicted Van Gogh in his The Painter of Sunflowers; Van Gogh painted pictures from memory, following Gauguin’s suggestion. Among these «imaginative» paintings is Memory of the Garden at Etten.^{[143][note 8]} Their first joint outdoor venture was at the Alyscamps, when they produced the pendants Les Alyscamps.^[144] The single painting Gauguin completed during his visit was his portrait of Van Gogh.^[145]

Van Gogh and Gauguin visited Montpellier in December 1888, where they saw works by Courbet and Delacroix in the Musée Fabre.^[146] Their relationship began to deteriorate; Van Gogh admired Gauguin and wanted to be treated as his equal, but Gauguin was arrogant and domineering, which frustrated Van Gogh. They often quarrelled; Van Gogh increasingly feared that Gauguin was going to desert him, and the situation, which Van Gogh described as one of «excessive tension», rapidly headed towards crisis point.^[147]

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• 

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  Paul Gauguin’s Armchair, 1888. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

Hospital in Arles (December 1888)

The exact sequence that led to the mutilation of van Gogh’s ear is not known. Gauguin said, fifteen years later, that the night followed several instances of physically threatening behaviour.^[149] Their relationship was complex and Theo may have owed money to Gauguin, who suspected the brothers were exploiting him financially.^[150] It seems likely that Vincent realised that Gauguin was planning to leave.^[150] The following days saw heavy rain, leading to the two men being shut in the Yellow House.^[151] Gauguin recalled that Van Gogh followed him after he left for a walk and «rushed towards me, an open razor in his hand.»^[151] This account is uncorroborated;^[152] Gauguin was almost certainly absent from the Yellow House that night, most likely staying in a hotel.^[151]

After an altercation on the evening of 23 December 1888,^[153] Van Gogh returned to his room where he seemingly heard voices and either wholly or in part severed his left ear with a razor^{[note 9]} causing severe bleeding.^[154] He bandaged the wound, wrapped the ear in paper and delivered the package to a woman at a brothel Van Gogh and Gauguin both frequented.^[154] Van Gogh was found unconscious the next morning by a policeman and taken to hospital,^[157][158] where he was treated by Félix Rey, a young doctor still in training. The ear was brought to the hospital, but Rey did not attempt to reattach it as too much time had passed.^[151] Van Gogh researcher and art historian Bernadette Murphy discovered the true identity of the woman named Gabrielle, who died in Arles at the age of 80 in 1952, and whose descendants still live just outside Arles. Gabrielle, known in her youth as «Gaby,» was a 17-year-old cleaning girl at the brothel and other local establishments at the time Van Gogh presented her with his ear.^{[153][159][160]}

Van Gogh had no recollection of the event, suggesting that he may have suffered an acute mental breakdown.^[161] The hospital diagnosis was «acute mania with generalised delirium»,^[162] and within a few days, the local police ordered that he be placed in hospital care.^[163][164] Gauguin immediately notified Theo, who, on 24 December, had proposed marriage to his old friend Andries Bonger’s sister Johanna.^[165] That evening, Theo rushed to the station to board a night train to Arles. He arrived on Christmas Day and comforted Vincent, who seemed to be semi-lucid. That evening, he left Arles for the return trip to Paris.^[166]

During the first days of his treatment, Van Gogh repeatedly and unsuccessfully asked for Gauguin, who asked a policeman attending the case to «be kind enough, Monsieur, to awaken this man with great care, and if he asks for me tell him I have left for Paris; the sight of me might prove fatal for him.»^[167] Gauguin fled Arles, never to see Van Gogh again. They continued to correspond, and in 1890, Gauguin proposed they form a studio in Antwerp. Meanwhile, other visitors to the hospital included Marie Ginoux and Roulin.^[168]

Despite a pessimistic diagnosis, Van Gogh recovered and returned to the Yellow House on 7 January 1889.^[169] He spent the following month between hospital and home, suffering from hallucinations and delusions of poisoning.^[170] In March, the police closed his house after a petition by 30 townspeople (including the Ginoux family) who described him as le fou roux «the redheaded madman»;^[163] Van Gogh returned to hospital. Paul Signac visited him twice in March;^[171] in April Van Gogh moved into rooms owned by Dr Rey after floods damaged paintings in his own home.^[172] Two months later, he left Arles and voluntarily entered an asylum in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence. Around this time, he wrote, «Sometimes moods of indescribable anguish, sometimes moments when the veil of time and fatality of circumstances seemed to be torn apart for an instant.»^[173]

Van Gogh gave his 1889 Portrait of Doctor Félix Rey to Dr Rey. The physician was not fond of the painting and used it to repair a chicken coop, then gave it away.^[174] In 2016, the portrait was housed at the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts and estimated to be worth over $50 million.^[175]

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  Self-portrait with Bandaged Ear and Pipe, 1889, private collection

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  The Courtyard of the Hospital at Arles, 1889, Oskar Reinhart Collection «Am Römerholz», Winterthur, Switzerland

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  Ward in the Hospital in Arles, 1889, Oskar Reinhart Collection «Am Römerholz», Winterthur, Switzerland

Saint-Rémy (May 1889 – May 1890)

Van Gogh entered the Saint-Paul-de-Mausole asylum on 8 May 1889, accompanied by his caregiver, Frédéric Salles, a Protestant clergyman. Saint-Paul was a former monastery in Saint-Rémy, located less than 30 kilometres (19 mi) from Arles, and it was run by a former naval doctor, Théophile Peyron. Van Gogh had two cells with barred windows, one of which he used as a studio.^[176] The clinic and its garden became the main subjects of his paintings. He made several studies of the hospital’s interiors, such as Vestibule of the Asylum and Saint-Rémy (September 1889), and its gardens, such as Lilacs (May 1889). Some of his works from this time are characterised by swirls, such as The Starry Night. He was allowed short supervised walks, during which time he painted cypresses and olive trees, including Valley with Ploughman Seen from Above, Olive Trees with the Alpilles in the Background 1889, Cypresses 1889, Cornfield with Cypresses (1889), Country road in Provence by Night (1890). In September 1889, he produced two further versions of Bedroom in Arles and The Gardener.^[177]

Limited access to life outside the clinic resulted in a shortage of subject matter. Van Gogh instead worked on interpretations of other artist’s paintings, such as Millet’s The Sower and Noonday Rest, and variations on his own earlier work. Van Gogh was an admirer of the Realism of Jules Breton, Gustave Courbet and Millet,^[178] and he compared his copies to a musician’s interpreting Beethoven.^[179]

His Prisoners’ Round (after Gustave Doré) (1890) was painted after an engraving by Gustave Doré (1832–1883). Tralbaut suggests that the face of the prisoner in the centre of the painting looking towards the viewer is Van Gogh himself;^[180] Jan Hulsker discounts this.^[181]

Between February and April 1890, Van Gogh suffered a severe relapse. Depressed and unable to bring himself to write, he was still able to paint and draw a little during this time,^[182] and he later wrote to Theo that he had made a few small canvases «from memory … reminisces of the North».^[183] Among these was Two Peasant Women Digging in a Snow-Covered Field at Sunset. Hulsker believes that this small group of paintings formed the nucleus of many drawings and study sheets depicting landscapes and figures that Van Gogh worked on during this time. He comments that this short period was the only time that Van Gogh’s illness had a significant effect on his work.^[184] Van Gogh asked his mother and his brother to send him drawings and rough work he had done in the early 1880s so he could work on new paintings from his old sketches.^[185] Belonging to this period is Sorrowing Old Man («At Eternity’s Gate»), a colour study Hulsker describes as «another unmistakable remembrance of times long past».^[98][186] His late paintings show an artist at the height of his abilities, according to the art critic Robert Hughes, «longing for concision and grace».^[123]

After the birth of his nephew, Van Gogh wrote, «I started right away to make a picture for him, to hang in their bedroom, branches of white almond blossom against a blue sky.»^[187]

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1890 Exhibitions and recognition

See also Vincent van Gogh’s display at Les XX, 1890

Albert Aurier praised his work in the Mercure de France in January 1890 and described him as «a genius».^[188] In February, Van Gogh painted five versions of L’Arlésienne (Madame Ginoux), based on a charcoal sketch Gauguin had produced when she sat for both artists in November 1888.^{[189][note 10]} Also in February, Van Gogh was invited by Les XX, a society of avant-garde painters in Brussels, to participate in their annual exhibition. At the opening dinner a Les XX member, Henry de Groux, insulted Van Gogh’s work. Toulouse-Lautrec demanded satisfaction, and Signac declared he would continue to fight for Van Gogh’s honour if Lautrec surrendered. De Groux apologised for the slight and left the group.

From 20 March to 27 April 1890, Van Gogh was included in the sixth exhibition of the Société des Artistes Indépendants in the Pavillon de la Ville de Paris on the Champs-Elysées. Van Gogh exhibited ten paintings. Eight of these can be identified as Cypresses (F 613 / JH 1746 ), Road menders (‘The tall plane trees’) (F 657 / JH 1860 ), Ravine (F 662 / JH 1804 ), Avenue of chestnut trees in blossom (F 517 / JH 1689 ), Mulberry tree (F 637 / JH 1796 ), Trees with ivy in the garden of the asylum (F 609 / JH 1693 ), Wheatfield at sunrise (F 737 / JH 1862 ). ‘Les Tournesols’ is either Sunflowers in a vase (F 454 / JH 1562 ) or Sunflowers in a vase (F 456 / JH 1561 ) Wheatfield after a storm (F 611 / JH 1723 ) and Olive grove (F 586 / JH 1854 ).^[190]

While Van Gogh’s exhibit was on display with the Artistes Indépendants in Paris, Claude Monet said that his work was the best in the show.^[191]

Auvers-sur-Oise (May–July 1890)

In May 1890, Van Gogh left the clinic in Saint-Rémy to move nearer to both Dr Paul Gachet in the Paris suburb of Auvers-sur-Oise and to Theo. Gachet was an amateur painter and had treated several other artists – Camille Pissarro had recommended him. Van Gogh’s first impression was that Gachet was «iller than I am, it seemed to me, or let’s say just as much.»^[192]

The painter Charles Daubigny moved to Auvers in 1861 and in turn drew other artists there, including Camille Corot and Honoré Daumier. In July 1890, Van Gogh completed two paintings of Daubigny’s Garden, one of which is likely his final work.^[193]

During his last weeks at Saint-Rémy, his thoughts returned to «memories of the North»,^[183] and several of the approximately 70 oils, painted during as many days in Auvers-sur-Oise, are reminiscent of northern scenes.^[194] In June 1890, he painted several portraits of his doctor, including Portrait of Dr Gachet, and his only etching. In each the emphasis is on Gachet’s melancholic disposition.^[195] There are other paintings which are probably unfinished, including Thatched Cottages by a Hill.^[193]

In July, Van Gogh wrote that he had become absorbed «in the immense plain against the hills, boundless as the sea, delicate yellow».^[196] He had first become captivated by the fields in May, when the wheat was young and green. In July, he described to Theo «vast fields of wheat under turbulent skies».^[197]

He wrote that they represented his «sadness and extreme loneliness» and that the «canvases will tell you what I cannot say in words, that is, how healthy and invigorating I find the countryside».^[198] Wheatfield with Crows, although not his last oil work, is from July 1890 and Hulsker discusses it as being associated with «melancholy and extreme loneliness».^[199] Hulsker identifies seven oil paintings from Auvers that follow the completion of Wheatfield with Crows.^[200]

Research published in 2020 by senior researchers at the museum Louis van Tilborgh and Teio Meedendorp, reviewing findings of Wouter van der Veen, the scientific director of the Institut Van Gogh, concluded that it was «highly plausible» that the exact location where Van Gogh’s final work Tree Roots was some 150 metres (490 ft) from the Auberge Ravoux inn where he was staying, where a stand of trees with a tangle of gnarled roots grew on a hillside. These trees with gnarled roots are shown in a postcard from 1900 to 1910. Mr Van der Veen believes Van Gogh may have been working on the painting just hours before his death.^[201][202]

Death

On 27 July 1890, aged 37, Van Gogh is believed to have shot himself in the chest with a 7 mm Lefaucheux pinfire revolver.^[203][204] There were no witnesses and he died 30 hours after the incident.^[174] The shooting may have taken place in the wheat field in which he had been painting, or in a local barn.^[205] The bullet was deflected by a rib and passed through his chest without doing apparent damage to internal organs – probably stopped by his spine. He was able to walk back to the Auberge Ravoux, where he was attended to by two doctors, but without a surgeon present the bullet could not be removed. The doctors tended to him as well as they could, then left him alone in his room, smoking his pipe. The following morning, Theo rushed to his brother’s side, finding him in good spirits. But within hours Vincent’s health began to fail, suffering from an untreated infection resulting from the wound. He died in the early hours of 29 July. According to Theo, Vincent’s last words were: «The sadness will last forever».^{[206][207][208][209]}

Van Gogh was buried on 30 July, in the municipal cemetery of Auvers-sur-Oise. The funeral was attended by Theo van Gogh, Andries Bonger, Charles Laval, Lucien Pissarro, Émile Bernard, Julien Tanguy and Paul Gachet, among twenty family members, friends and locals. Theo had been ill, and his health began to decline further after his brother’s death. Weak and unable to come to terms with Vincent’s absence, he died on 25 January 1891 at Den Dolder and was buried in Utrecht.^[210] In 1914, Johanna van Gogh-Bonger had Theo’s body exhumed and moved from Utrecht to be re-buried alongside Vincent’s at Auvers-sur-Oise.^[211]

There have been numerous debates as to the nature of Van Gogh’s illness and its effect on his work, and many retrospective diagnoses have been proposed. The consensus is that Van Gogh had an episodic condition with periods of normal functioning.^[212] Perry was the first to suggest bipolar disorder in 1947,^[213] and this has been supported by the psychiatrists Hemphill and Blumer.^[214][215] Biochemist Wilfred Arnold has countered that the symptoms are more consistent with acute intermittent porphyria, noting that the popular link between bipolar disorder and creativity might be spurious.^[212] Temporal lobe epilepsy with bouts of depression has also been suggested.^[215] Whatever the diagnosis, his condition was likely worsened by malnutrition, overwork, insomnia and alcohol.^[215]

The gun Van Gogh was reputed to have used was rediscovered in 1965 and was auctioned, on 19 June 2019, as «the most famous weapon in art history». The gun sold for €162,500 (£144,000; $182,000), almost three times more than expected.^{[216][217][218]}

Style and works

Artistic development

Van Gogh drew, and painted with watercolours while at school, but only a few examples survive and the authorship of some has been challenged.^[219] When he took up art as an adult, he began at an elementary level. In early 1882, his uncle, Cornelis Marinus, owner of a well-known gallery of contemporary art in Amsterdam, asked for drawings of The Hague. Van Gogh’s work did not live up to expectations. Marinus offered a second commission, specifying the subject matter in detail, but was again disappointed with the result. Van Gogh persevered; he experimented with lighting in his studio using variable shutters and different drawing materials. For more than a year he worked on single figures – highly elaborate studies in black and white,^{[note 11]} which at the time gained him only criticism. Later, they were recognised as early masterpieces.^[221]

In August 1882 Theo gave Vincent money to buy materials for working en plein air. Vincent wrote that he could now «go on painting with new vigour».^[222] From early 1883 he worked on multi-figure compositions. He had some of them photographed, but when his brother remarked that they lacked liveliness and freshness, he destroyed them and turned to oil painting. Van Gogh turned to well-known Hague School artists like Weissenbruch and Blommers, and he received technical advice from them as well as from painters like De Bock and Van der Weele, both of the Hague School’s second generation.^[223] He moved to Nuenen after a short period of time in Drenthe and began work on several large paintings but destroyed most of them. The Potato Eaters and its companion pieces are the only ones to have survived.^[223] Following a visit to the Rijksmuseum Van Gogh wrote of his admiration for the quick, economical brushwork of the Dutch Masters, especially Rembrandt and Frans Hals.^{[224][note 12]} He was aware many of his faults were due to lack of experience and technical expertise,^[223] so in November 1885 he travelled to Antwerp and later Paris to learn and develop his skills.^[225]

Theo criticised The Potato Eaters for its dark palette, which he thought unsuitable for a modern style.^[226] During Van Gogh’s stay in Paris between 1886 and 1887, he tried to master a new, lighter palette. His Portrait of Père Tanguy (1887) shows his success with the brighter palette and is evidence of an evolving personal style.^[227] Charles Blanc’s treatise on colour interested him greatly and led him to work with complementary colours. Van Gogh came to believe that the effect of colour went beyond the descriptive; he said that «colour expresses something in itself».^[228][229] According to Hughes, Van Gogh perceived colour as having a «psychological and moral weight», as exemplified in the garish reds and greens of The Night Café, a work he wanted to «express the terrible passions of humanity».^[230] Yellow meant the most to him, because it symbolised emotional truth. He used yellow as a symbol for sunlight, life, and God.^[231]

Van Gogh strove to be a painter of rural life and nature;^[232] during his first summer in Arles he used his new palette to paint landscapes and traditional rural life.^[233] His belief that a power existed behind the natural led him to try to capture a sense of that power, or the essence of nature in his art, sometimes through the use of symbols.^[234] His renditions of the sower, at first copied from Jean-François Millet, reflect Van Gogh’s religious beliefs: the sower as Christ sowing life beneath the hot sun.^[235] These were themes and motifs he returned to often to rework and develop.^[236] His paintings of flowers are filled with symbolism, but rather than use traditional Christian iconography he made up his own, where life is lived under the sun and work is an allegory of life.^[237] In Arles, having gained confidence after painting spring blossoms and learning to capture bright sunlight, he was ready to paint The Sower.^[228]

Van Gogh stayed within what he called the «guise of reality»^[238] and was critical of overly stylised works.^[239] He wrote afterwards that the abstraction of Starry Night had gone too far and that reality had «receded too far in the background».^[239] Hughes describes it as a moment of extreme visionary ecstasy: the stars are in a great whirl, reminiscent of Hokusai’s Great Wave, the movement in the heaven above is reflected by the movement of the cypress on the earth below, and the painter’s vision is «translated into a thick, emphatic plasma of paint».^[240]

Between 1885 and his death in 1890, Van Gogh appears to have been building an oeuvre,^[241] a collection that reflected his personal vision and could be commercially successful. He was influenced by Blanc’s definition of style, that a true painting required optimal use of colour, perspective and brushstrokes. Van Gogh applied the word «purposeful» to paintings he thought he had mastered, as opposed to those he thought of as studies.^[242] He painted many series of studies;^[238] most of which were still lifes, many executed as colour experiments or as gifts to friends.^[243] The work in Arles contributed considerably to his oeuvre: those he thought the most important from that time were The Sower, Night Cafe, Memory of the Garden in Etten and Starry Night. With their broad brushstrokes, inventive perspectives, colours, contours and designs, these paintings represent the style he sought.^[239]

Major series

Van Gogh’s stylistic developments are usually linked to the periods he spent living in different places across Europe. He was inclined to immerse himself in local cultures and lighting conditions, although he maintained a highly individual visual outlook throughout. His evolution as an artist was slow, and he was aware of his painterly limitations. He moved home often, perhaps to expose himself to new visual stimuli, and through exposure develop his technical skill.^[244] Art historian Melissa McQuillan believes the moves also reflect later stylistic changes, and that Van Gogh used the moves to avoid conflict, and as a coping mechanism for when the idealistic artist was faced with the realities of his then current situation.^[245]

Portraits

Van Gogh said portaiture was his greatest interest. «What I’m most passionate about, much much more than all the rest in my profession,» he wrote in 1890, «is the portrait, the modern portrait.»^[246] It is «the only thing in painting that moves me deeply and that gives me a sense of the infinite.»^[243][247] He wrote to his sister that he wished to paint portraits that would endure, and that he would use colour to capture their emotions and character rather than aiming for photographic realism.^[248] Those closest to Van Gogh are mostly absent from his portraits; he rarely painted Theo, Van Rappard or Bernard. The portraits of his mother were from photographs.^[249]

Van Gogh painted Arles’ postmaster Joseph Roulin and his family repeatedly. In five versions of La Berceuse (The Lullaby), Van Gogh painted Augustine Roulin quietly holding a rope that rocks the unseen cradle of her infant daughter. Van Gogh had planned for it to be the central image of a triptych, flanked by paintings of sunflowers. ^[250]

• 

  La Berceuse (Augustine Roulin), 1889, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Self-portraits

Van Gogh created more than 43 self-portraits between 1885 and 1889.^{[251][note 13]} They were usually completed in series, such as those painted in Paris in mid-1887, and continued until shortly before his death.^[252] Generally the portraits were studies, created during periods when he was reluctant to mix with others, or when he lacked models, and so painted himself.^[243][253]

The self-portraits reflect a high degree of self-scrutiny.^[254] Often they were intended to mark important periods in his life; for example, the mid-1887 Paris series were painted at the point where he became aware of Claude Monet, Paul Cézanne and Signac.^[255] In Self-Portrait with Grey Felt Hat, heavy strains of paint spread outwards across the canvas. It is one of his most renowned self-portraits of that period, «with its highly organized rhythmic brushstrokes, and the novel halo derived from the Neo-impressionist repertoire was what Van Gogh himself called a ‘purposeful’ canvas».^[256]

They contain a wide array of physiognomical representations.^[251] Van Gogh’s mental and physical condition is usually apparent; he may appear unkempt, unshaven or with a neglected beard, with deeply sunken eyes, a weak jaw, or having lost teeth. Some show him with full lips, a long face or prominent skull, or sharpened, alert features. His hair is sometimes depicted in a vibrant reddish hue and at other times ash colored.^[251]

Van Gogh’s self-portraits vary stylistically. In those painted after December 1888, the strong contrast of vivid colors highlight the haggard pallor of his skin.^[253] Some depict the artist with a beard, others without. He can be seen with bandages in portraits executed just after he mutilated his ear. In only a few does he depict himself as a painter.^[251] Those painted in Saint-Rémy show the head from the right, the side opposite his damaged ear, as he painted himself reflected in his mirror.^[257][258]

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  Self-Portrait with Grey Felt Hat, Winter 1887–88. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

• 

  Self-Portrait, 1889. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. His Saint-Rémy self-portraits show his side with the unmutilated ear, as he saw himself in the mirror

• 

  Self-Portrait Without Beard, c. September 1889. This painting may have been Van Gogh’s last self-portrait. He gave it to his mother as a birthday gift.^[259][260]

Flowers

Van Gogh painted several landscapes with flowers, including roses, lilacs, irises, and sunflowers. Some reflect his interests in the language of colour, and also in Japanese ukiyo-e.^[261] There are two series of dying sunflowers. The first was painted in Paris in 1887 and shows flowers lying on the ground. The second set was completed a year later in Arles and is of bouquets in a vase positioned in early morning light.^[262] Both are built from thickly layered paintwork, which, according to the London National Gallery, evoke the «texture of the seed-heads».^[263]

In these series, Van Gogh was not preoccupied by his usual interest in filling his paintings with subjectivity and emotion; rather, the two series are intended to display his technical skill and working methods to Gauguin,^[145] who was about to visit. The 1888 paintings were created during a rare period of optimism for the artist. Vincent wrote to Theo in August 1888: «I’m painting with the gusto of a Marseillais eating bouillabaisse, which won’t surprise you when it’s a question of painting large sunflowers … If I carry out this plan there’ll be a dozen or so panels. The whole thing will therefore be a symphony in blue and yellow. I work on it all these mornings, from sunrise. Because the flowers wilt quickly and it’s a matter of doing the whole thing in one go.»^[264]

The sunflowers were painted to decorate the walls in anticipation of Gauguin’s visit, and Van Gogh placed individual works around the Yellow House’s guest room in Arles. Gauguin was deeply impressed and later acquired two of the Paris versions.^[145] After Gauguin’s departure, Van Gogh imagined the two major versions of the sunflowers as wings of the Berceuse Triptych, and included them in his Les XX in Brussels exhibit. Today the major pieces of the series are among his best known, celebrated for the sickly connotations of the colour yellow and its tie-in with the Yellow House, the expressionism of the brush strokes, and their contrast against often dark backgrounds.^[265]

• 

• 

• 

  Still Life: Vase with Irises Against a Yellow Background, May 1890, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam^[266]

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  Still Life: Pink Roses in a Vase, May 1890, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York^[266]

Cypresses and olives

Fifteen canvases depict cypresses, a tree he became fascinated with in Arles.^[267] He brought life to the trees, which were traditionally seen as emblematic of death.^[234] The series of cypresses he began in Arles featured the trees in the distance, as windbreaks in fields; when he was at Saint-Rémy he brought them to the foreground.^[268] Vincent wrote to Theo in May 1889: «Cypresses still preoccupy me, I should like to do something with them like my canvases of sunflowers»; he went on to say, «They are beautiful in line and proportion like an Egyptian obelisk.»^[269]

In mid-1889, and at his sister Wil’s request, Van Gogh painted several smaller versions of Wheat Field with Cypresses.^[270] The works are characterised by swirls and densely painted impasto, and include The Starry Night, in which cypresses dominate the foreground.^[267] In addition to this, other notable works on cypresses include Cypresses (1889), Cypresses with Two Figures (1889–90), and Road with Cypress and Star (1890).^[271]

During the last six or seven months of the year 1889, he had also created at least fifteen paintings of olive trees, a subject which he considered as demanding and compelling.^[272] Among these works are Olive Trees with the Alpilles in the Background (1889), about which in a letter to his brother Van Gogh wrote, «At last I have a landscape with olives».^[271] While in Saint-Rémy, Van Gogh spent time outside the asylum, where he painted trees in the olive groves. In these works, natural life is rendered as gnarled and arthritic as if a personification of the natural world, which are, according to Hughes, filled with «a continuous field of energy of which nature is a manifestation».^[234]

• 

  Cypresses in Starry Night, a reed pen drawing executed by Van Gogh after the painting in 1889.

• 

  Cypresses and Two Women, February 1890. Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, Netherlands

• 

  Cypresses, 1889. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Orchards

The Flowering Orchards (also the Orchards in Blossom) are among the first groups of work completed after Van Gogh’s arrival in Arles in February 1888. The 14 paintings are optimistic, joyous and visually expressive of the burgeoning spring. They are delicately sensitive and unpopulated. He painted swiftly, and although he brought to this series a version of Impressionism, a strong sense of personal style began to emerge during this period. The transience of the blossoming trees, and the passing of the season, seemed to align with his sense of impermanence and belief in a new beginning in Arles. During the blossoming of the trees that spring, he found «a world of motifs that could not have been more Japanese».^[273] Vincent wrote to Theo on 21 April 1888 that he had 10 orchards and «one big [painting] of a cherry tree, which I’ve spoiled».^[274]

During this period Van Gogh mastered the use of light by subjugating shadows and painting the trees as if they are the source of light – almost in a sacred manner.^[273] Early the following year he painted another smaller group of orchards, including View of Arles, Flowering Orchards.^[275] Van Gogh was enthralled by the landscape and vegetation of the south of France, and often visited the farm gardens near Arles. In the vivid light of the Mediterranean climate his palette significantly brightened.^[276]

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  Pink Peach Tree in Blossom (Reminiscence of Mauve), watercolour, March 1888. Kröller-Müller Museum

• 

  The Pink Orchard also Orchard with Blossoming Apricot Trees, March 1888. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

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  Orchard in Blossom, Bordered by Cypresses, April 1888. Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, Netherlands

• 

Wheat fields

Van Gogh made several painting excursions during visits to the landscape around Arles. He made paintings of harvests, wheat fields and other rural landmarks of the area, including The Old Mill (1888); a good example of a picturesque structure bordering the wheat fields beyond.^[125] At various points, Van Gogh painted the view from his window – at The Hague, Antwerp, and Paris. These works culminated in The Wheat Field series, which depicted the view from his cells in the asylum at Saint-Rémy.^[277]

Many of the late paintings are sombre but essentially optimistic and, right up to the time of Van Gogh’s death, reflect his desire to return to lucid mental health. Yet some of his final works reflect his deepening concerns.^[278][279] Writing in July 1890, from Auvers, Van Gogh said that he had become absorbed «in the immense plain against the hills, boundless as the sea, delicate yellow».^[196]

Van Gogh was captivated by the fields in May when the wheat was young and green. His Wheatfields at Auvers with White House shows a more subdued palette of yellows and blues, which creates a sense of idyllic harmony.^[280]

About 10 July 1890, Van Gogh wrote to Theo of «vast fields of wheat under troubled skies».^[281] Wheatfield with Crows shows the artist’s state of mind in his final days; Hulsker describes the work as a «doom-filled painting with threatening skies and ill-omened crows».^[199] Its dark palette and heavy brushstrokes convey a sense of menace.^[282]

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  Enclosed Wheat Field with Rising Sun, May 1889, Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, Netherlands

• 

  Wheat Fields, early June 1889. Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo

Reputation and legacy

After Van Gogh’s first exhibitions in the late 1880s, his reputation grew steadily among artists, art critics, dealers and collectors.^[283] In 1887, André Antoine hung Van Gogh’s alongside works of Georges Seurat and Paul Signac, at the Théâtre Libre in Paris; some were acquired by Julien Tanguy.^[284] In 1889, his work was described in the journal Le Moderniste Illustré by Albert Aurier as characterised by «fire, intensity, sunshine».^[285] Ten paintings were shown at the Société des Artistes Indépendants, in Brussels in January 1890.^[286] French president Marie François Sadi Carnot was said to have been impressed by Van Gogh’s work.^[287]

After Van Gogh’s death, memorial exhibitions were held in Brussels, Paris, The Hague and Antwerp. His work was shown in several high-profile exhibitions, including six works at Les XX; in 1891 there was a retrospective exhibition in Brussels.^[286] In 1892, Octave Mirbeau wrote that Van Gogh’s suicide was an «infinitely sadder loss for art … even though the populace has not crowded to a magnificent funeral, and poor Vincent van Gogh, whose demise means the extinction of a beautiful flame of genius, has gone to his death as obscure and neglected as he lived.»^[284]

Theo died in January 1891, removing Vincent’s most vocal and well-connected champion.^[288] Theo’s widow Johanna van Gogh-Bonger was a Dutchwoman in her twenties who had not known either her husband or her brother-in-law very long and who suddenly had to take care of several hundreds of paintings, letters and drawings, as well as her infant son, Vincent Willem van Gogh.^{[283][note 14]} Gauguin was not inclined to offer assistance in promoting Van Gogh’s reputation, and Johanna’s brother Andries Bonger also seemed lukewarm about his work.^[283] Aurier, one of Van Gogh’s earliest supporters among the critics, died of typhoid fever in 1892 at the age of 27.^[290]

In 1892, Émile Bernard organised a small solo show of Van Gogh’s paintings in Paris, and Julien Tanguy exhibited his Van Gogh paintings with several consigned from Johanna van Gogh-Bonger. In April 1894, the Durand-Ruel Gallery in Paris agreed to take 10 paintings on consignment from Van Gogh’s estate.^[290] In 1896, the Fauvist painter Henri Matisse, then an unknown art student, visited John Russell on Belle Île off Brittany.^[291][292] Russell had been a close friend of Van Gogh; he introduced Matisse to the Dutchman’s work, and gave him a Van Gogh drawing. Influenced by Van Gogh, Matisse abandoned his earth-coloured palette for bright colours.^[292][293]

In Paris in 1901, a large Van Gogh retrospective was held at the Bernheim-Jeune Gallery, which excited André Derain and Maurice de Vlaminck, and contributed to the emergence of Fauvism.^[290] Important group exhibitions took place with the Sonderbund artists in Cologne in 1912, the Armory Show, New York in 1913, and Berlin in 1914.^[294] Henk Bremmer was instrumental in teaching and talking about Van Gogh,^[295] and introduced Helene Kröller-Müller to Van Gogh’s art; she became an avid collector of his work.^[296] The early figures in German Expressionism such as Emil Nolde acknowledged a debt to Van Gogh’s work.^[297] Bremmer assisted Jacob Baart de la Faille, whose catalogue raisonné L’Oeuvre de Vincent van Gogh appeared in 1928.^{[298][note 15]}
Van Gogh’s fame reached its first peak in Austria and Germany before World War I,^[301] helped by the publication of his letters in three volumes in 1914.^[302] His letters are expressive and literate, and have been described as among the foremost 19th-century writings of their kind.^[8] These began a compelling mythology of Van Gogh as an intense and dedicated painter who suffered for his art and died young.^[303] In 1934, the novelist Irving Stone wrote a biographical novel of Van Gogh’s life titled Lust for Life, based on Van Gogh’s letters to Theo.^[304] This novel and the 1956 film further enhanced his fame, especially in the United States where Stone surmised only a few hundred people had heard of Van Gogh prior to his surprise best-selling book.^[305][306]

In 1957, Francis Bacon based a series of paintings on reproductions of Van Gogh’s The Painter on the Road to Tarascon, the original of which was destroyed during the Second World War. Bacon was inspired by an image he described as «haunting», and regarded Van Gogh as an alienated outsider, a position which resonated with him. Bacon identified with Van Gogh’s theories of art and quoted lines written to Theo: «[R]eal painters do not paint things as they are … [T]hey paint them as they themselves feel them to be.»^[307]

Van Gogh’s works are among the world’s most expensive paintings. Those sold for over US$100 million (today’s equivalent) include Portrait of Dr Gachet,^[308] Portrait of Joseph Roulin and Irises. The Metropolitan Museum of Art acquired a copy of Wheat Field with Cypresses in 1993 for US$57 million by using funds donated by publisher, diplomat and philanthropist Walter Annenberg.^[309] In 2015, L’Allée des Alyscamps sold for US$66.3 million at Sotheby’s, New York, exceeding its reserve of US$40 million.^[310]

Minor planet 4457 van Gogh is named in his honour.^[311]

In October 2022, two activists protesting the effects of the fossil fuel industry on climate change threw a can of tomato soup on Van Gogh’s Sunflowers in the National Gallery, London, and then glued their hands to the gallery wall. As the painting was covered by glass it was not damaged. ^[312][313]

Van Gogh Museum

Van Gogh’s nephew and namesake, Vincent Willem van Gogh (1890–1978),^[314] inherited the estate after his mother’s death in 1925. During the early 1950s he arranged for the publication of a complete edition of the letters presented in four volumes and several languages. He then began negotiations with the Dutch government to subsidise a foundation to purchase and house the entire collection.^[315] Theo’s son participated in planning the project in the hope that the works would be exhibited under the best possible conditions. The project began in 1963; architect Gerrit Rietveld was commissioned to design it, and after his death in 1964 Kisho Kurokawa took charge.^[316] Work progressed throughout the 1960s, with 1972 as the target for its grand opening.^[314]

The Van Gogh Museum opened in the Museumplein in Amsterdam in 1973.^[317] It became the second most popular museum in the Netherlands, after the Rijksmuseum, regularly receiving more than 1.5 million visitors a year. In 2015 it had a record 1.9 million.^[318] Eighty-five percent of the visitors come from other countries.^[319]

Nazi-looted art

During the Nazi period (1933–1945) a great number of artworks by Van Gogh changed hands, many of them looted from Jewish collectors who were forced into exile or murdered. Some of these works have disappeared into private collections. Others have since resurfaced in museums, or at auction, or have been reclaimed, often in high-profile lawsuits, by their former owners.^[320] The German Lost Art Foundation still lists dozens of missing van Goghs^[321] and the American Alliance of Museums lists 73 van Goghs on the Nazi Era Provenance Internet Portal.^[322]

References

Footnotes

References

Sources

External links

• The Vincent van Gogh Gallery, the complete works and letters of Van Gogh
• Vincent van Gogh The letters, the complete letters of Van Gogh (translated into English and annotated)
• Vincent Van Gogh, teaching resource on Van Gogh
• Works by Vincent van Gogh at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about Vincent van Gogh at Internet Archive
• Works by Vincent van Gogh at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)

Vincent van Gogh
Self-Portrait, 1887, Art Institute of Chicago
Born	Vincent Willem van Gogh 30 March 1853 Zundert, Netherlands
Died	29 July 1890 (aged 37) Auvers-sur-Oise, France
Cause of death	Gunshot wound
Resting place	Cimetière d’Auvers-sur-Oise, France 49°04′31″N 2°10′44″E / 49.07531°N 2.17894°E
Education	Royal Academy of Fine Arts Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts
Known for	Painting, drawing still life, portraits and landscapes
Notable work	The Potato Eaters (1885) Sunflowers (1887) Bedroom in Arles (1888) The Starry Night (1889) Portrait of Dr. Gachet (1890) Wheatfield with Crows (1890) The Siesta (1890) Church at Auvers (1890) Sorrowing Old Man (1890)
Movement	Post-Impressionism
Family	Theodorus van Gogh (brother)

Vincent Willem van Gogh (Dutch: [ˈvɪnsɛnt ˈʋɪləm vɑŋ ˈɣɔx] (listen);^{[note 1]} 30 March 1853 – 29 July 1890) was a Dutch Post-Impressionist painter who posthumously became one of the most famous and influential figures in Western art history. In a decade, he created about 2,100 artworks, including around 860 oil paintings, most of which date from the last two years of his life. They include landscapes, still lifes, portraits and self-portraits, and are characterised by bold colours and dramatic, impulsive and expressive brushwork that contributed to the foundations of modern art. Not commercially successful, he struggled with severe depression and poverty, eventually leading to his suicide at age thirty-seven.

Born into an upper-middle class family, Van Gogh drew as a child and was serious, quiet, and thoughtful. As a young man, he worked as an art dealer, often traveling, but became depressed after he was transferred to London. He turned to religion and spent time as a Protestant missionary in southern Belgium. He drifted in ill health and solitude before taking up painting in 1881, having moved back home with his parents. His younger brother Theo supported him financially; the two kept a long correspondence by letter. His early works, mostly still lifes and depictions of peasant labourers, contain few signs of the vivid colour that distinguished his later work. In 1886, he moved to Paris, where he met members of the avant-garde, including Émile Bernard and Paul Gauguin, who were reacting against the Impressionist sensibility. As his work developed he created a new approach to still lifes and local landscapes. His paintings grew brighter as he developed a style that became fully realised during his stay in Arles in the South of France in 1888. During this period he broadened his subject matter to include series of olive trees, wheat fields and sunflowers.

Van Gogh suffered from psychotic episodes and delusions and though he worried about his mental stability, he often neglected his physical health, did not eat properly and drank heavily. His friendship with Gauguin ended after a confrontation with a razor when, in a rage, he severed part of his own left ear. He spent time in psychiatric hospitals, including a period at Saint-Rémy. After he discharged himself and moved to the Auberge Ravoux in Auvers-sur-Oise near Paris, he came under the care of the homeopathic doctor Paul Gachet. His depression persisted, and on 27 July 1890, Van Gogh is believed to have shot himself in the chest with a revolver, dying from his injuries two days later.

Van Gogh was commercially unsuccessful during his lifetime, and he was considered a madman and a failure. As he only became famous after his suicide, he came to be seen as a misunderstood genius in the public imagination.^[6] His reputation grew in the early 20th century as elements of his style came to be incorporated by the Fauves and German Expressionists. He attained widespread critical and commercial success over the ensuing decades, and is remembered as an important but tragic painter whose troubled personality typifies the romantic ideal of the tortured artist. Today, Van Gogh’s works are among the world’s most expensive paintings to have ever sold, and his legacy is honoured by a museum in his name, the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, which holds the world’s largest collection of his paintings and drawings.

Letters

The most comprehensive primary source on Van Gogh is the correspondence between him and his younger brother, Theo. Their lifelong friendship, and most of what is known of Vincent’s thoughts and theories of art, are recorded in the hundreds of letters they exchanged from 1872 until 1890.^[7] Theo van Gogh was an art dealer and provided his brother with financial and emotional support as well as access to influential people on the contemporary art scene.^[8]

Theo kept all of Vincent’s letters to him;^[10] but Vincent kept only few of the letters he received. After both had died, Theo’s widow Jo Bonger-van Gogh arranged for the publication of some of their letters. A few appeared in 1906 and 1913; the majority were published in 1914.^[11][12] Vincent’s letters are eloquent and expressive and have been described as having a «diary-like intimacy»,^[8] and read in parts like autobiography.^[8] Translator Arnold Pomerans wrote that their publication adds a «fresh dimension to the understanding of Van Gogh’s artistic achievement, an understanding granted to us by virtually no other painter».^[13]

There are more than 600 letters from Vincent to Theo and around 40 from Theo to Vincent. There are 22 to his sister Wil, 58 to the painter Anthon van Rappard, 22 to Émile Bernard as well as individual letters to Paul Signac, Paul Gauguin, and the critic Albert Aurier. Some are illustrated with sketches.^[8] Many are undated, but art historians have been able to place most in chronological order. Problems in transcription and dating remain, mainly with those posted from Arles. While there, Vincent wrote around 200 letters in Dutch, French, and English.^[14] There is a gap in the record when he lived in Paris as the brothers lived together and had no need to correspond.^[15]

The highly paid contemporary artist Jules Breton was frequently mentioned in Vincent’s letters. In 1875 letters to Theo, Vincent mentions he saw Breton, discusses the Breton paintings he saw at a Salon, and discusses sending one of Breton’s books but only on the condition that it be returned.^[16][17] In a March 1884 letter to Rappard he discusses one of Breton’s poems that had inspired one of his own paintings.^[18] In 1885 he describes Breton’s famous work The Song of the Lark as being «fine».^[19] In March 1880, roughly midway between these letters, Van Gogh set out on an 80-kilometre trip on foot to meet with Breton in the village of Courrières; however, he was apparently intimidated by Breton’s success and/or the high wall around his estate. He turned around and returned without making his presence known.^[20][21][22] It appears Breton was unaware of Van Gogh or his attempted visit. There are no known letters between the two artists and Van Gogh is not one of the contemporary artists discussed by Breton in his 1891 autobiography Life of an Artist.

Life

Early years

Vincent Willem van Gogh was born on 30 March 1853 in Groot-Zundert, in the predominantly Catholic province of North Brabant in the Netherlands.^[23] He was the oldest surviving child of Theodorus van Gogh (1822–1885), a minister of the Dutch Reformed Church, and his wife, Anna Cornelia Carbentus (1819–1907). Van Gogh was given the name of his grandfather and of a brother stillborn exactly a year before his birth.^{[note 2]} Vincent was a common name in the Van Gogh family. The name had been borne by his grandfather, the prominent art dealer Vincent (1789–1874), and a theology graduate at the University of Leiden in 1811. This Vincent had six sons, three of whom became art dealers, and may have been named after his own great-uncle, a sculptor (1729–1802).^[25]

Van Gogh’s mother came from a prosperous family in The Hague,^[26] and his father was the youngest son of a minister.^[27] The two met when Anna’s younger sister, Cornelia, married Theodorus’s older brother Vincent (Cent). Van Gogh’s parents married in May 1851, and moved to Zundert.^[28] His brother Theo was born on 1 May 1857. There was another brother, Cor, and three sisters: Elisabeth, Anna, and Willemina (known as «Wil»). In later life, Van Gogh remained in touch only with Willemina and Theo.^[29] Van Gogh’s mother was a rigid and religious woman who emphasized the importance of family to the point of for those around her.^[30] Theodorus’s salary as a minister was modest, but the Church also supplied the family with a house, a maid, two cooks, a gardener, a carriage and horse; his mother Anna instilled in the children a duty to uphold the family’s high social position.^[31]

Van Gogh was a serious and thoughtful child.^[32] He was taught at home by his mother and a governess, and in 1860, was sent to the village school. In 1864, he was placed in a boarding school at Zevenbergen,^[33] where he felt abandoned, and he campaigned to come home. Instead, in 1866, his parents sent him to the middle school in Tilburg, where he was also deeply unhappy.^[34] His interest in art began at a young age. He was encouraged to draw as a child by his mother,^[35] and his early drawings are expressive,^[33] but do not approach the intensity of his later work.^[36] Constant Cornelis Huijsmans, who had been a successful artist in Paris, taught the students at Tilburg. His philosophy was to reject technique in favour of capturing the impressions of things, particularly nature or common objects. Van Gogh’s profound unhappiness seems to have overshadowed the lessons, which had little effect.^[37] In March 1868, he abruptly returned home. He later wrote that his youth was «austere and cold, and sterile».^[38]

In July 1869, Van Gogh’s uncle Cent obtained a position for him at the art dealers Goupil & Cie in The Hague.^[39] After completing his training in 1873, he was transferred to Goupil’s London branch on Southampton Street, and took lodgings at 87 Hackford Road, Stockwell.^[40] This was a happy time for Van Gogh; he was successful at work and, at 20, was earning more than his father. Theo’s wife, Jo Van Gogh-Bonger, later remarked that this was the best year of Vincent’s life. He became infatuated with his landlady’s daughter, Eugénie Loyer, but she rejected him after confessing his feelings; she was secretly engaged to a former lodger. He grew more isolated and religiously fervent. His father and uncle arranged a transfer to Paris in 1875, where he became resentful of issues such as the degree to which the art dealers commodified art, and he was dismissed a year later.^[41]

In April 1876, he returned to England to take unpaid work as a supply teacher in a small boarding school in Ramsgate. When the proprietor moved to Isleworth in Middlesex, Van Gogh went with him.^[42][43] The arrangement was not successful; he left to become a Methodist minister’s assistant.^[44] His parents had meanwhile moved to Etten;^[45] in 1876 he returned home at Christmas for six months and took work at a bookshop in Dordrecht. He was unhappy in the position and spent his time doodling or translating passages from the Bible into English, French, and German.^[46] He immersed himself in Christianity, and became increasingly pious and monastic.^[47] According to his flatmate of the time, Paulus van Görlitz, Van Gogh ate frugally, avoiding meat.^[48]

To support his religious conviction and his desire to become a pastor, in 1877, the family sent him to live with his uncle Johannes Stricker, a respected theologian, in Amsterdam.^[49] Van Gogh prepared for the University of Amsterdam theology entrance examination;^[50] he failed the exam and left his uncle’s house in July 1878. He undertook, but also failed, a three-month course at a Protestant missionary school in Laken, near Brussels.^[51]

In January 1879, he took up a post as a missionary at Petit-Wasmes^[52] in the working class, coal-mining district of Borinage in Belgium. To show support for his impoverished congregation, he gave up his comfortable lodgings at a bakery to a homeless person and moved to a small hut, where he slept on straw.^[53] His humble living conditions did not endear him to church authorities, who dismissed him for «undermining the dignity of the priesthood». He then walked the 75 kilometres (47 mi) to Brussels,^[54] returned briefly to Cuesmes in the Borinage, but he gave in to pressure from his parents to return home to Etten. He stayed there until around March 1880,^{[note 3]} which caused concern and frustration for his parents. His father was especially frustrated and advised that his son be committed to the lunatic asylum in Geel.^{[56][57][note 4]}

Van Gogh returned to Cuesmes in August 1880, where he lodged with a miner until October.^[59] He became interested in the people and scenes around him, and he recorded them in drawings after Theo’s suggestion that he take up art in earnest. He traveled to Brussels later in the year, to follow Theo’s recommendation that he study with the Dutch artist Willem Roelofs, who persuaded him – in spite of his dislike of formal schools of art – to attend the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts. He registered at the Académie in November 1880, where he studied anatomy and the standard rules of modelling and perspective.^[60]

Etten, Drenthe and The Hague

Van Gogh returned to Etten in April 1881 for an extended stay with his parents.^[61] He continued to draw, often using his neighbours as subjects. In August 1881, his recently widowed cousin, Cornelia «Kee» Vos-Stricker, daughter of his mother’s older sister Willemina and Johannes Stricker, arrived for a visit. He was thrilled and took long walks with her. Kee was seven years older than he was and had an eight-year-old son. Van Gogh surprised everyone by declaring his love to her and proposing marriage.^[62] She refused with the words «No, nay, never» («nooit, neen, nimmer«).^[63] After Kee returned to Amsterdam, Van Gogh went to The Hague to try to sell paintings and to meet with his second cousin, Anton Mauve. Mauve was the successful artist Van Gogh longed to be.^[64] Mauve invited him to return in a few months and suggested he spend the intervening time working in charcoal and pastels; Van Gogh returned to Etten and followed this advice.^[64]

Late in November 1881, Van Gogh wrote a letter to Johannes Stricker, one which he described to Theo as an attack.^[65] Within days he left for Amsterdam.^[66] Kee would not meet him, and her parents wrote that his «persistence is disgusting«.^[67] In despair, he held his left hand in the flame of a lamp, with the words: «Let me see her for as long as I can keep my hand in the flame.»^[67][68] He did not recall the event well, but later assumed that his uncle had blown out the flame. Kee’s father made it clear that her refusal should be heeded and that the two would not marry, largely because of Van Gogh’s inability to support himself.^[69]

Mauve took Van Gogh on as a student and introduced him to watercolour, which he worked on for the next month before returning home for Christmas.^[70] He quarrelled with his father, refusing to attend church, and left for The Hague.^{[note 5][71]} In January 1882, Mauve introduced him to painting in oil and lent him money to set up a studio.^[72][73] Within a month Van Gogh and Mauve fell out, possibly over the viability of drawing from plaster casts.^[74] Van Gogh could afford to hire only people from the street as models, a practice of which Mauve seems to have disapproved.^[75] In June Van Gogh suffered a bout of gonorrhoea and spent three weeks in hospital.^[76] Soon after, he first painted in oils,^[77] bought with money borrowed from Theo. He liked the medium, and he spread the paint liberally, scraping from the canvas and working back with the brush. He wrote that he was surprised at how good the results were.^[78]

By March 1882, Mauve appeared to have gone cold towards Van Gogh, and he stopped replying to his letters.^[79] He had learned of Van Gogh’s new domestic arrangement with an alcoholic prostitute, Clasina Maria «Sien» Hoornik (1850–1904), and her young daughter.^[80] Van Gogh had met Sien towards the end of January 1882, when she had a five-year-old daughter and was pregnant. She had previously borne two children who died, but Van Gogh was unaware of this.^[81] On 2 July, she gave birth to a baby boy, Willem.^[82] When Van Gogh’s father discovered the details of their relationship, he put pressure on his son to abandon Sien and her two children. Vincent at first defied him,^[83] and considered moving the family out of the city, but in late 1883, he left Sien and the children.^[84]

Poverty may have pushed Sien back into prostitution; the home became less happy and Van Gogh may have felt family life was irreconcilable with his artistic development. Sien gave her daughter to her mother and baby Willem to her brother.^[85] Willem remembered visiting Rotterdam when he was about 12, when an uncle tried to persuade Sien to marry to legitimise the child.^[86] He believed Van Gogh was his father, but the timing of his birth makes this unlikely.^[87] Sien drowned herself in the River Scheldt in 1904.^[88]

In September 1883, Van Gogh moved to Drenthe in the northern Netherlands. In December driven by loneliness, he went to live with his parents, then in Nuenen, North Brabant.^[88]

Emerging artist

Nuenen and Antwerp (1883–1886)

In Nuenen, Van Gogh focused on painting and drawing. Working outside and very quickly, he completed sketches and paintings of weavers and their cottages. Van Gogh also completed The Parsonage Garden at Nuenen, which was stolen from the Singer Laren in March 2020.^[89][90] From August 1884, Margot Begemann, a neighbour’s daughter ten years his senior, joined him on his forays; she fell in love and he reciprocated, though less enthusiastically. They wanted to marry, but neither side of their families were in favour. Margot was distraught and took an overdose of strychnine, but survived after Van Gogh rushed her to a nearby hospital.^[82] On 26 March 1885, his father died of a heart attack.^[91]

Van Gogh painted several groups of still lifes in 1885.^[92] During his two-year stay in Nuenen, he completed numerous drawings and watercolours and nearly 200 oil paintings. His palette consisted mainly of sombre earth tones, particularly dark brown, and showed no sign of the vivid colours that distinguished his later work.^[93]

There was interest from a dealer in Paris early in 1885.^[94] Theo asked Vincent if he had paintings ready to exhibit.^[95] In May, Van Gogh responded with his first major work, The Potato Eaters, and a series of «peasant character studies» which were the culmination of several years of work.^[96] When he complained that Theo was not making enough effort to sell his paintings in Paris, his brother responded that they were too dark and not in keeping with the bright style of Impressionism.^[93] In August his work was publicly exhibited for the first time, in the shop windows of the dealer Leurs in The Hague. One of his young peasant sitters became pregnant in September 1885; Van Gogh was accused of forcing himself upon her, and the village priest forbade parishioners to model for him.^[97]

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  Worn Out, pencil on watercolour paper, 1882. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam^[98]

• 

He moved to Antwerp that November and rented a room above a paint dealer’s shop in the rue des Images (Lange Beeldekensstraat).^[99] He lived in poverty and ate poorly, preferring to spend the money Theo sent on painting materials and models. Bread, coffee and tobacco became his staple diet. In February 1886, he wrote to Theo that he could only remember eating six hot meals since the previous May. His teeth became loose and painful.^[100] In Antwerp he applied himself to the study of colour theory and spent time in museums—particularly studying the work of Peter Paul Rubens—and broadened his palette to include carmine, cobalt blue and emerald green. Van Gogh bought Japanese ukiyo-e woodcuts in the docklands, later incorporating elements of their style into the background of some of his paintings.^[101] He was drinking heavily again,^[102] and was hospitalised between February and March 1886,^[103] when he was possibly also treated for syphilis.^{[104][note 6]}

After his recovery, despite his antipathy towards academic teaching, he took the higher-level admission exams at the Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp and, in January 1886, matriculated in painting and drawing. He became ill and run down by overwork, poor diet and excessive smoking.^[107] He started to attend drawing classes after plaster models at the Antwerp Academy on 18 January 1886. He quickly got into trouble with Charles Verlat, the director of the academy and teacher of a painting class, because of his unconventional painting style. Van Gogh had also clashed with the instructor of the drawing class Franz Vinck. Van Gogh finally started to attend the drawing classes after antique plaster models given by Eugène Siberdt. Soon Siberdt and Van Gogh came into conflict when the latter did not comply with Siberdt’s requirement that drawings express the contour and concentrate on the line. When Van Gogh was required to draw the Venus de Milo during a drawing class, he produced the limbless, naked torso of a Flemish peasant woman. Siberdt regarded this as defiance against his artistic guidance and made corrections to Van Gogh’s drawing with his crayon so vigorously that he tore the paper. Van Gogh then flew into a violent rage and shouted at Siberdt: ‘You clearly do not know what a young woman is like, God damn it! A woman must have hips, buttocks, a pelvis in which she can carry a baby!’ According to some accounts, this was the last time Van Gogh attended classes at the academy and he left later for Paris.^[108] On 31 March 1886, which was about a month after the confrontation with Siberdt, the teachers of the academy decided that 17 students, including Van Gogh, had to repeat a year. The story that Van Gogh was expelled from the academy by Siberdt is therefore unfounded.^[109]

Paris (1886–1888)

Van Gogh moved to Paris in March 1886 where he shared Theo’s rue Laval apartment in Montmartre and studied at Fernand Cormon’s studio. In June the brothers took a larger flat at 54 rue Lepic.^[111] In Paris, Vincent painted portraits of friends and acquaintances, still life paintings, views of Le Moulin de la Galette, scenes in Montmartre, Asnières and along the Seine. In 1885 in Antwerp he had become interested in Japanese ukiyo-e woodblock prints and had used them to decorate the walls of his studio; while in Paris he collected hundreds of them. He tried his hand at Japonaiserie, tracing a figure from a reproduction on the cover of the magazine Paris Illustre, The Courtesan or Oiran (1887), after Keisai Eisen, which he then graphically enlarged in a painting.^[112]

After seeing the portrait of Adolphe Monticelli at the Galerie Delareybarette, Van Gogh adopted a brighter palette and a bolder attack, particularly in paintings such as his Seascape at Saintes-Maries (1888).^[113][114] Two years later, Vincent and Theo paid for the publication of a book on Monticelli paintings, and Vincent bought some of Monticelli’s works to add to his collection.^[115]

Van Gogh learned about Fernand Cormon’s atelier from Theo.^[116] He worked at the studio in April and May 1886,^[117] where he frequented the circle of the Australian artist John Russell, who painted his portrait in 1886.^[118] Van Gogh also met fellow students Émile Bernard, Louis Anquetin and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec – who painted a portrait of him in pastel. They met at Julien «Père» Tanguy’s paint shop,^[117] (which was, at that time, the only place where Paul Cézanne’s paintings were displayed). In 1886, two large exhibitions were staged there, showing Pointillism and Neo-impressionism for the first time and bringing attention to Georges Seurat and Paul Signac. Theo kept a stock of Impressionist paintings in his gallery on boulevard Montmartre, but Van Gogh was slow to acknowledge the new developments in art.^[119]

Conflicts arose between the brothers. At the end of 1886 Theo found living with Vincent to be «almost unbearable».^[117] By early 1887, they were again at peace, and Vincent had moved to Asnières, a northwestern suburb of Paris, where he got to know Signac. He adopted elements of Pointillism, a technique in which a multitude of small coloured dots are applied to the canvas so that when seen from a distance they create an optical blend of hues. The style stresses the ability of complementary colours – including blue and orange – to form vibrant contrasts.^[95][117]

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  Courtesan (after Eisen), 1887. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

• 

While in Asnières Van Gogh painted parks, restaurants and the Seine, including Bridges across the Seine at Asnières. In November 1887, Theo and Vincent befriended Paul Gauguin who had just arrived in Paris.^[120] Towards the end of the year, Vincent arranged an exhibition alongside Bernard, Anquetin, and probably Toulouse-Lautrec, at the Grand-Bouillon Restaurant du Chalet, 43 avenue de Clichy, Montmartre. In a contemporary account, Bernard wrote that the exhibition was ahead of anything else in Paris.^[121] There, Bernard and Anquetin sold their first paintings, and Van Gogh exchanged work with Gauguin. Discussions on art, artists, and their social situations started during this exhibition, continued and expanded to include visitors to the show, like Camille Pissarro and his son Lucien, Signac and Seurat. In February 1888, feeling worn out from life in Paris, Van Gogh left, having painted more than 200 paintings during his two years there. Hours before his departure, accompanied by Theo, he paid his first and only visit to Seurat in his studio.^[122]

Artistic breakthrough

Arles (1888–89)

Ill from drink and suffering from smoker’s cough, in February 1888 Van Gogh sought refuge in Arles.^[14] He seems to have moved with thoughts of founding an art colony. The Danish artist Christian Mourier-Petersen became his companion for two months, and, at first, Arles appeared exotic. In a letter, he described it as a foreign country: «The Zouaves, the brothels, the adorable little Arlésienne going to her First Communion, the priest in his surplice, who looks like a dangerous rhinoceros, the people drinking absinthe, all seem to me creatures from another world.»^[123]

The time in Arles became one of Van Gogh’s more prolific periods: he completed 200 paintings and more than 100 drawings and watercolours.^[124] He was enchanted by the local countryside and light; his works from this period are rich in yellow, ultramarine and mauve. They include harvests, wheat fields and general rural landmarks from the area, including The Old Mill (1888), one of seven canvases sent to Pont-Aven on 4 October 1888 in an exchange of works with Paul Gauguin, Émile Bernard, Charles Laval and others.^[125]
The portrayals of Arles are informed by his Dutch upbringing; the patchworks of fields and avenues are flat and lacking perspective, but excel in their use of colour.^[126]

In March 1888 he painted landscapes using a gridded «perspective frame»; three of the works were shown at the annual exhibition of the Société des Artistes Indépendants. In April, he was visited by the American artist Dodge MacKnight, who was living nearby at Fontvieille.^[127][128] On 1 May 1888, for 15 francs per month, he signed a lease for the eastern wing of the Yellow House at 2 place Lamartine. The rooms were unfurnished and had been uninhabited for months.^[129]

On 7 May, Van Gogh moved from the Hôtel Carrel to the Café de la Gare,^[130] having befriended the proprietors, Joseph and Marie Ginoux. The Yellow House had to be furnished before he could fully move in, but he was able to use it as a studio.^[131] He wanted a gallery to display his work and started a series of paintings that eventually included Van Gogh’s Chair (1888), Bedroom in Arles (1888), The Night Café (1888), Café Terrace at Night (September 1888), Starry Night Over the Rhone (1888), and Still Life: Vase with Twelve Sunflowers (1888), all intended for the decoration for the Yellow House.^[132]

Van Gogh wrote that with The Night Café he tried «to express the idea that the café is a place where one can ruin oneself, go mad, or commit a crime».^[133] When he visited Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer in June, he gave lessons to a Zouave second lieutenant – Paul-Eugène Milliet^[134] – and painted boats on the sea and the village.^[135] MacKnight introduced Van Gogh to Eugène Boch, a Belgian painter who sometimes stayed in Fontvieille, and the two exchanged visits in July.^[134]

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  The Sower with Setting Sun, 1888. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

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  Fishing Boats on the Beach at Saintes-Maries, June 1888. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

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Gauguin’s visit (1888)

When Gauguin agreed to visit Arles in 1888, Van Gogh hoped for friendship and to realize his idea of an artists’ collective. Van Gogh prepared for Gauguin’s arrival by painting four versions of Sunflowers in one week.^[136] «In the hope of living in a studio of our own with Gauguin,» he wrote in a letter to Theo, «I’d like to do a decoration for the studio. Nothing but large Sunflowers.»^[137]

When Boch visited again, Van Gogh painted a portrait of him, as well as the study The Poet Against a Starry Sky.^{[138][note 7]}

In preparation for Gauguin’s visit, Van Gogh bought two beds on advice from the station’s postal supervisor Joseph Roulin, whose portrait he painted. On 17 September, he spent his first night in the still sparsely furnished Yellow House.^[140] When Gauguin consented to work and live in Arles with him, Van Gogh started to work on the Décoration for the Yellow House, probably the most ambitious effort he ever undertook.^[141] He completed two chair paintings: Van Gogh’s Chair and Gauguin’s Chair.^[142]

After much pleading from Van Gogh, Gauguin arrived in Arles on 23 October and, in November, the two painted together. Gauguin depicted Van Gogh in his The Painter of Sunflowers; Van Gogh painted pictures from memory, following Gauguin’s suggestion. Among these «imaginative» paintings is Memory of the Garden at Etten.^{[143][note 8]} Their first joint outdoor venture was at the Alyscamps, when they produced the pendants Les Alyscamps.^[144] The single painting Gauguin completed during his visit was his portrait of Van Gogh.^[145]

Van Gogh and Gauguin visited Montpellier in December 1888, where they saw works by Courbet and Delacroix in the Musée Fabre.^[146] Their relationship began to deteriorate; Van Gogh admired Gauguin and wanted to be treated as his equal, but Gauguin was arrogant and domineering, which frustrated Van Gogh. They often quarrelled; Van Gogh increasingly feared that Gauguin was going to desert him, and the situation, which Van Gogh described as one of «excessive tension», rapidly headed towards crisis point.^[147]

• 

• 

• 

  Paul Gauguin’s Armchair, 1888. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

Hospital in Arles (December 1888)

The exact sequence that led to the mutilation of van Gogh’s ear is not known. Gauguin said, fifteen years later, that the night followed several instances of physically threatening behaviour.^[149] Their relationship was complex and Theo may have owed money to Gauguin, who suspected the brothers were exploiting him financially.^[150] It seems likely that Vincent realised that Gauguin was planning to leave.^[150] The following days saw heavy rain, leading to the two men being shut in the Yellow House.^[151] Gauguin recalled that Van Gogh followed him after he left for a walk and «rushed towards me, an open razor in his hand.»^[151] This account is uncorroborated;^[152] Gauguin was almost certainly absent from the Yellow House that night, most likely staying in a hotel.^[151]

After an altercation on the evening of 23 December 1888,^[153] Van Gogh returned to his room where he seemingly heard voices and either wholly or in part severed his left ear with a razor^{[note 9]} causing severe bleeding.^[154] He bandaged the wound, wrapped the ear in paper and delivered the package to a woman at a brothel Van Gogh and Gauguin both frequented.^[154] Van Gogh was found unconscious the next morning by a policeman and taken to hospital,^[157][158] where he was treated by Félix Rey, a young doctor still in training. The ear was brought to the hospital, but Rey did not attempt to reattach it as too much time had passed.^[151] Van Gogh researcher and art historian Bernadette Murphy discovered the true identity of the woman named Gabrielle, who died in Arles at the age of 80 in 1952, and whose descendants still live just outside Arles. Gabrielle, known in her youth as «Gaby,» was a 17-year-old cleaning girl at the brothel and other local establishments at the time Van Gogh presented her with his ear.^{[153][159][160]}

Van Gogh had no recollection of the event, suggesting that he may have suffered an acute mental breakdown.^[161] The hospital diagnosis was «acute mania with generalised delirium»,^[162] and within a few days, the local police ordered that he be placed in hospital care.^[163][164] Gauguin immediately notified Theo, who, on 24 December, had proposed marriage to his old friend Andries Bonger’s sister Johanna.^[165] That evening, Theo rushed to the station to board a night train to Arles. He arrived on Christmas Day and comforted Vincent, who seemed to be semi-lucid. That evening, he left Arles for the return trip to Paris.^[166]

During the first days of his treatment, Van Gogh repeatedly and unsuccessfully asked for Gauguin, who asked a policeman attending the case to «be kind enough, Monsieur, to awaken this man with great care, and if he asks for me tell him I have left for Paris; the sight of me might prove fatal for him.»^[167] Gauguin fled Arles, never to see Van Gogh again. They continued to correspond, and in 1890, Gauguin proposed they form a studio in Antwerp. Meanwhile, other visitors to the hospital included Marie Ginoux and Roulin.^[168]

Despite a pessimistic diagnosis, Van Gogh recovered and returned to the Yellow House on 7 January 1889.^[169] He spent the following month between hospital and home, suffering from hallucinations and delusions of poisoning.^[170] In March, the police closed his house after a petition by 30 townspeople (including the Ginoux family) who described him as le fou roux «the redheaded madman»;^[163] Van Gogh returned to hospital. Paul Signac visited him twice in March;^[171] in April Van Gogh moved into rooms owned by Dr Rey after floods damaged paintings in his own home.^[172] Two months later, he left Arles and voluntarily entered an asylum in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence. Around this time, he wrote, «Sometimes moods of indescribable anguish, sometimes moments when the veil of time and fatality of circumstances seemed to be torn apart for an instant.»^[173]

Van Gogh gave his 1889 Portrait of Doctor Félix Rey to Dr Rey. The physician was not fond of the painting and used it to repair a chicken coop, then gave it away.^[174] In 2016, the portrait was housed at the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts and estimated to be worth over $50 million.^[175]

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  Self-portrait with Bandaged Ear and Pipe, 1889, private collection

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  The Courtyard of the Hospital at Arles, 1889, Oskar Reinhart Collection «Am Römerholz», Winterthur, Switzerland

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  Ward in the Hospital in Arles, 1889, Oskar Reinhart Collection «Am Römerholz», Winterthur, Switzerland

Saint-Rémy (May 1889 – May 1890)

Van Gogh entered the Saint-Paul-de-Mausole asylum on 8 May 1889, accompanied by his caregiver, Frédéric Salles, a Protestant clergyman. Saint-Paul was a former monastery in Saint-Rémy, located less than 30 kilometres (19 mi) from Arles, and it was run by a former naval doctor, Théophile Peyron. Van Gogh had two cells with barred windows, one of which he used as a studio.^[176] The clinic and its garden became the main subjects of his paintings. He made several studies of the hospital’s interiors, such as Vestibule of the Asylum and Saint-Rémy (September 1889), and its gardens, such as Lilacs (May 1889). Some of his works from this time are characterised by swirls, such as The Starry Night. He was allowed short supervised walks, during which time he painted cypresses and olive trees, including Valley with Ploughman Seen from Above, Olive Trees with the Alpilles in the Background 1889, Cypresses 1889, Cornfield with Cypresses (1889), Country road in Provence by Night (1890). In September 1889, he produced two further versions of Bedroom in Arles and The Gardener.^[177]

Limited access to life outside the clinic resulted in a shortage of subject matter. Van Gogh instead worked on interpretations of other artist’s paintings, such as Millet’s The Sower and Noonday Rest, and variations on his own earlier work. Van Gogh was an admirer of the Realism of Jules Breton, Gustave Courbet and Millet,^[178] and he compared his copies to a musician’s interpreting Beethoven.^[179]

His Prisoners’ Round (after Gustave Doré) (1890) was painted after an engraving by Gustave Doré (1832–1883). Tralbaut suggests that the face of the prisoner in the centre of the painting looking towards the viewer is Van Gogh himself;^[180] Jan Hulsker discounts this.^[181]

Between February and April 1890, Van Gogh suffered a severe relapse. Depressed and unable to bring himself to write, he was still able to paint and draw a little during this time,^[182] and he later wrote to Theo that he had made a few small canvases «from memory … reminisces of the North».^[183] Among these was Two Peasant Women Digging in a Snow-Covered Field at Sunset. Hulsker believes that this small group of paintings formed the nucleus of many drawings and study sheets depicting landscapes and figures that Van Gogh worked on during this time. He comments that this short period was the only time that Van Gogh’s illness had a significant effect on his work.^[184] Van Gogh asked his mother and his brother to send him drawings and rough work he had done in the early 1880s so he could work on new paintings from his old sketches.^[185] Belonging to this period is Sorrowing Old Man («At Eternity’s Gate»), a colour study Hulsker describes as «another unmistakable remembrance of times long past».^[98][186] His late paintings show an artist at the height of his abilities, according to the art critic Robert Hughes, «longing for concision and grace».^[123]

After the birth of his nephew, Van Gogh wrote, «I started right away to make a picture for him, to hang in their bedroom, branches of white almond blossom against a blue sky.»^[187]

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1890 Exhibitions and recognition

See also Vincent van Gogh’s display at Les XX, 1890

Albert Aurier praised his work in the Mercure de France in January 1890 and described him as «a genius».^[188] In February, Van Gogh painted five versions of L’Arlésienne (Madame Ginoux), based on a charcoal sketch Gauguin had produced when she sat for both artists in November 1888.^{[189][note 10]} Also in February, Van Gogh was invited by Les XX, a society of avant-garde painters in Brussels, to participate in their annual exhibition. At the opening dinner a Les XX member, Henry de Groux, insulted Van Gogh’s work. Toulouse-Lautrec demanded satisfaction, and Signac declared he would continue to fight for Van Gogh’s honour if Lautrec surrendered. De Groux apologised for the slight and left the group.

From 20 March to 27 April 1890, Van Gogh was included in the sixth exhibition of the Société des Artistes Indépendants in the Pavillon de la Ville de Paris on the Champs-Elysées. Van Gogh exhibited ten paintings. Eight of these can be identified as Cypresses (F 613 / JH 1746 ), Road menders (‘The tall plane trees’) (F 657 / JH 1860 ), Ravine (F 662 / JH 1804 ), Avenue of chestnut trees in blossom (F 517 / JH 1689 ), Mulberry tree (F 637 / JH 1796 ), Trees with ivy in the garden of the asylum (F 609 / JH 1693 ), Wheatfield at sunrise (F 737 / JH 1862 ). ‘Les Tournesols’ is either Sunflowers in a vase (F 454 / JH 1562 ) or Sunflowers in a vase (F 456 / JH 1561 ) Wheatfield after a storm (F 611 / JH 1723 ) and Olive grove (F 586 / JH 1854 ).^[190]

While Van Gogh’s exhibit was on display with the Artistes Indépendants in Paris, Claude Monet said that his work was the best in the show.^[191]

Auvers-sur-Oise (May–July 1890)

In May 1890, Van Gogh left the clinic in Saint-Rémy to move nearer to both Dr Paul Gachet in the Paris suburb of Auvers-sur-Oise and to Theo. Gachet was an amateur painter and had treated several other artists – Camille Pissarro had recommended him. Van Gogh’s first impression was that Gachet was «iller than I am, it seemed to me, or let’s say just as much.»^[192]

The painter Charles Daubigny moved to Auvers in 1861 and in turn drew other artists there, including Camille Corot and Honoré Daumier. In July 1890, Van Gogh completed two paintings of Daubigny’s Garden, one of which is likely his final work.^[193]

During his last weeks at Saint-Rémy, his thoughts returned to «memories of the North»,^[183] and several of the approximately 70 oils, painted during as many days in Auvers-sur-Oise, are reminiscent of northern scenes.^[194] In June 1890, he painted several portraits of his doctor, including Portrait of Dr Gachet, and his only etching. In each the emphasis is on Gachet’s melancholic disposition.^[195] There are other paintings which are probably unfinished, including Thatched Cottages by a Hill.^[193]

In July, Van Gogh wrote that he had become absorbed «in the immense plain against the hills, boundless as the sea, delicate yellow».^[196] He had first become captivated by the fields in May, when the wheat was young and green. In July, he described to Theo «vast fields of wheat under turbulent skies».^[197]

He wrote that they represented his «sadness and extreme loneliness» and that the «canvases will tell you what I cannot say in words, that is, how healthy and invigorating I find the countryside».^[198] Wheatfield with Crows, although not his last oil work, is from July 1890 and Hulsker discusses it as being associated with «melancholy and extreme loneliness».^[199] Hulsker identifies seven oil paintings from Auvers that follow the completion of Wheatfield with Crows.^[200]

Research published in 2020 by senior researchers at the museum Louis van Tilborgh and Teio Meedendorp, reviewing findings of Wouter van der Veen, the scientific director of the Institut Van Gogh, concluded that it was «highly plausible» that the exact location where Van Gogh’s final work Tree Roots was some 150 metres (490 ft) from the Auberge Ravoux inn where he was staying, where a stand of trees with a tangle of gnarled roots grew on a hillside. These trees with gnarled roots are shown in a postcard from 1900 to 1910. Mr Van der Veen believes Van Gogh may have been working on the painting just hours before his death.^[201][202]

Death

On 27 July 1890, aged 37, Van Gogh is believed to have shot himself in the chest with a 7 mm Lefaucheux pinfire revolver.^[203][204] There were no witnesses and he died 30 hours after the incident.^[174] The shooting may have taken place in the wheat field in which he had been painting, or in a local barn.^[205] The bullet was deflected by a rib and passed through his chest without doing apparent damage to internal organs – probably stopped by his spine. He was able to walk back to the Auberge Ravoux, where he was attended to by two doctors, but without a surgeon present the bullet could not be removed. The doctors tended to him as well as they could, then left him alone in his room, smoking his pipe. The following morning, Theo rushed to his brother’s side, finding him in good spirits. But within hours Vincent’s health began to fail, suffering from an untreated infection resulting from the wound. He died in the early hours of 29 July. According to Theo, Vincent’s last words were: «The sadness will last forever».^{[206][207][208][209]}

Van Gogh was buried on 30 July, in the municipal cemetery of Auvers-sur-Oise. The funeral was attended by Theo van Gogh, Andries Bonger, Charles Laval, Lucien Pissarro, Émile Bernard, Julien Tanguy and Paul Gachet, among twenty family members, friends and locals. Theo had been ill, and his health began to decline further after his brother’s death. Weak and unable to come to terms with Vincent’s absence, he died on 25 January 1891 at Den Dolder and was buried in Utrecht.^[210] In 1914, Johanna van Gogh-Bonger had Theo’s body exhumed and moved from Utrecht to be re-buried alongside Vincent’s at Auvers-sur-Oise.^[211]

There have been numerous debates as to the nature of Van Gogh’s illness and its effect on his work, and many retrospective diagnoses have been proposed. The consensus is that Van Gogh had an episodic condition with periods of normal functioning.^[212] Perry was the first to suggest bipolar disorder in 1947,^[213] and this has been supported by the psychiatrists Hemphill and Blumer.^[214][215] Biochemist Wilfred Arnold has countered that the symptoms are more consistent with acute intermittent porphyria, noting that the popular link between bipolar disorder and creativity might be spurious.^[212] Temporal lobe epilepsy with bouts of depression has also been suggested.^[215] Whatever the diagnosis, his condition was likely worsened by malnutrition, overwork, insomnia and alcohol.^[215]

The gun Van Gogh was reputed to have used was rediscovered in 1965 and was auctioned, on 19 June 2019, as «the most famous weapon in art history». The gun sold for €162,500 (£144,000; $182,000), almost three times more than expected.^{[216][217][218]}

Style and works

Artistic development

Van Gogh drew, and painted with watercolours while at school, but only a few examples survive and the authorship of some has been challenged.^[219] When he took up art as an adult, he began at an elementary level. In early 1882, his uncle, Cornelis Marinus, owner of a well-known gallery of contemporary art in Amsterdam, asked for drawings of The Hague. Van Gogh’s work did not live up to expectations. Marinus offered a second commission, specifying the subject matter in detail, but was again disappointed with the result. Van Gogh persevered; he experimented with lighting in his studio using variable shutters and different drawing materials. For more than a year he worked on single figures – highly elaborate studies in black and white,^{[note 11]} which at the time gained him only criticism. Later, they were recognised as early masterpieces.^[221]

In August 1882 Theo gave Vincent money to buy materials for working en plein air. Vincent wrote that he could now «go on painting with new vigour».^[222] From early 1883 he worked on multi-figure compositions. He had some of them photographed, but when his brother remarked that they lacked liveliness and freshness, he destroyed them and turned to oil painting. Van Gogh turned to well-known Hague School artists like Weissenbruch and Blommers, and he received technical advice from them as well as from painters like De Bock and Van der Weele, both of the Hague School’s second generation.^[223] He moved to Nuenen after a short period of time in Drenthe and began work on several large paintings but destroyed most of them. The Potato Eaters and its companion pieces are the only ones to have survived.^[223] Following a visit to the Rijksmuseum Van Gogh wrote of his admiration for the quick, economical brushwork of the Dutch Masters, especially Rembrandt and Frans Hals.^{[224][note 12]} He was aware many of his faults were due to lack of experience and technical expertise,^[223] so in November 1885 he travelled to Antwerp and later Paris to learn and develop his skills.^[225]

Theo criticised The Potato Eaters for its dark palette, which he thought unsuitable for a modern style.^[226] During Van Gogh’s stay in Paris between 1886 and 1887, he tried to master a new, lighter palette. His Portrait of Père Tanguy (1887) shows his success with the brighter palette and is evidence of an evolving personal style.^[227] Charles Blanc’s treatise on colour interested him greatly and led him to work with complementary colours. Van Gogh came to believe that the effect of colour went beyond the descriptive; he said that «colour expresses something in itself».^[228][229] According to Hughes, Van Gogh perceived colour as having a «psychological and moral weight», as exemplified in the garish reds and greens of The Night Café, a work he wanted to «express the terrible passions of humanity».^[230] Yellow meant the most to him, because it symbolised emotional truth. He used yellow as a symbol for sunlight, life, and God.^[231]

Van Gogh strove to be a painter of rural life and nature;^[232] during his first summer in Arles he used his new palette to paint landscapes and traditional rural life.^[233] His belief that a power existed behind the natural led him to try to capture a sense of that power, or the essence of nature in his art, sometimes through the use of symbols.^[234] His renditions of the sower, at first copied from Jean-François Millet, reflect Van Gogh’s religious beliefs: the sower as Christ sowing life beneath the hot sun.^[235] These were themes and motifs he returned to often to rework and develop.^[236] His paintings of flowers are filled with symbolism, but rather than use traditional Christian iconography he made up his own, where life is lived under the sun and work is an allegory of life.^[237] In Arles, having gained confidence after painting spring blossoms and learning to capture bright sunlight, he was ready to paint The Sower.^[228]

Van Gogh stayed within what he called the «guise of reality»^[238] and was critical of overly stylised works.^[239] He wrote afterwards that the abstraction of Starry Night had gone too far and that reality had «receded too far in the background».^[239] Hughes describes it as a moment of extreme visionary ecstasy: the stars are in a great whirl, reminiscent of Hokusai’s Great Wave, the movement in the heaven above is reflected by the movement of the cypress on the earth below, and the painter’s vision is «translated into a thick, emphatic plasma of paint».^[240]

Between 1885 and his death in 1890, Van Gogh appears to have been building an oeuvre,^[241] a collection that reflected his personal vision and could be commercially successful. He was influenced by Blanc’s definition of style, that a true painting required optimal use of colour, perspective and brushstrokes. Van Gogh applied the word «purposeful» to paintings he thought he had mastered, as opposed to those he thought of as studies.^[242] He painted many series of studies;^[238] most of which were still lifes, many executed as colour experiments or as gifts to friends.^[243] The work in Arles contributed considerably to his oeuvre: those he thought the most important from that time were The Sower, Night Cafe, Memory of the Garden in Etten and Starry Night. With their broad brushstrokes, inventive perspectives, colours, contours and designs, these paintings represent the style he sought.^[239]

Major series

Van Gogh’s stylistic developments are usually linked to the periods he spent living in different places across Europe. He was inclined to immerse himself in local cultures and lighting conditions, although he maintained a highly individual visual outlook throughout. His evolution as an artist was slow, and he was aware of his painterly limitations. He moved home often, perhaps to expose himself to new visual stimuli, and through exposure develop his technical skill.^[244] Art historian Melissa McQuillan believes the moves also reflect later stylistic changes, and that Van Gogh used the moves to avoid conflict, and as a coping mechanism for when the idealistic artist was faced with the realities of his then current situation.^[245]

Portraits

Van Gogh said portaiture was his greatest interest. «What I’m most passionate about, much much more than all the rest in my profession,» he wrote in 1890, «is the portrait, the modern portrait.»^[246] It is «the only thing in painting that moves me deeply and that gives me a sense of the infinite.»^[243][247] He wrote to his sister that he wished to paint portraits that would endure, and that he would use colour to capture their emotions and character rather than aiming for photographic realism.^[248] Those closest to Van Gogh are mostly absent from his portraits; he rarely painted Theo, Van Rappard or Bernard. The portraits of his mother were from photographs.^[249]

Van Gogh painted Arles’ postmaster Joseph Roulin and his family repeatedly. In five versions of La Berceuse (The Lullaby), Van Gogh painted Augustine Roulin quietly holding a rope that rocks the unseen cradle of her infant daughter. Van Gogh had planned for it to be the central image of a triptych, flanked by paintings of sunflowers. ^[250]

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  La Berceuse (Augustine Roulin), 1889, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Self-portraits

Van Gogh created more than 43 self-portraits between 1885 and 1889.^{[251][note 13]} They were usually completed in series, such as those painted in Paris in mid-1887, and continued until shortly before his death.^[252] Generally the portraits were studies, created during periods when he was reluctant to mix with others, or when he lacked models, and so painted himself.^[243][253]

The self-portraits reflect a high degree of self-scrutiny.^[254] Often they were intended to mark important periods in his life; for example, the mid-1887 Paris series were painted at the point where he became aware of Claude Monet, Paul Cézanne and Signac.^[255] In Self-Portrait with Grey Felt Hat, heavy strains of paint spread outwards across the canvas. It is one of his most renowned self-portraits of that period, «with its highly organized rhythmic brushstrokes, and the novel halo derived from the Neo-impressionist repertoire was what Van Gogh himself called a ‘purposeful’ canvas».^[256]

They contain a wide array of physiognomical representations.^[251] Van Gogh’s mental and physical condition is usually apparent; he may appear unkempt, unshaven or with a neglected beard, with deeply sunken eyes, a weak jaw, or having lost teeth. Some show him with full lips, a long face or prominent skull, or sharpened, alert features. His hair is sometimes depicted in a vibrant reddish hue and at other times ash colored.^[251]

Van Gogh’s self-portraits vary stylistically. In those painted after December 1888, the strong contrast of vivid colors highlight the haggard pallor of his skin.^[253] Some depict the artist with a beard, others without. He can be seen with bandages in portraits executed just after he mutilated his ear. In only a few does he depict himself as a painter.^[251] Those painted in Saint-Rémy show the head from the right, the side opposite his damaged ear, as he painted himself reflected in his mirror.^[257][258]

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  Self-Portrait with Grey Felt Hat, Winter 1887–88. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

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  Self-Portrait, 1889. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. His Saint-Rémy self-portraits show his side with the unmutilated ear, as he saw himself in the mirror

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  Self-Portrait Without Beard, c. September 1889. This painting may have been Van Gogh’s last self-portrait. He gave it to his mother as a birthday gift.^[259][260]

Flowers

Van Gogh painted several landscapes with flowers, including roses, lilacs, irises, and sunflowers. Some reflect his interests in the language of colour, and also in Japanese ukiyo-e.^[261] There are two series of dying sunflowers. The first was painted in Paris in 1887 and shows flowers lying on the ground. The second set was completed a year later in Arles and is of bouquets in a vase positioned in early morning light.^[262] Both are built from thickly layered paintwork, which, according to the London National Gallery, evoke the «texture of the seed-heads».^[263]

In these series, Van Gogh was not preoccupied by his usual interest in filling his paintings with subjectivity and emotion; rather, the two series are intended to display his technical skill and working methods to Gauguin,^[145] who was about to visit. The 1888 paintings were created during a rare period of optimism for the artist. Vincent wrote to Theo in August 1888: «I’m painting with the gusto of a Marseillais eating bouillabaisse, which won’t surprise you when it’s a question of painting large sunflowers … If I carry out this plan there’ll be a dozen or so panels. The whole thing will therefore be a symphony in blue and yellow. I work on it all these mornings, from sunrise. Because the flowers wilt quickly and it’s a matter of doing the whole thing in one go.»^[264]

The sunflowers were painted to decorate the walls in anticipation of Gauguin’s visit, and Van Gogh placed individual works around the Yellow House’s guest room in Arles. Gauguin was deeply impressed and later acquired two of the Paris versions.^[145] After Gauguin’s departure, Van Gogh imagined the two major versions of the sunflowers as wings of the Berceuse Triptych, and included them in his Les XX in Brussels exhibit. Today the major pieces of the series are among his best known, celebrated for the sickly connotations of the colour yellow and its tie-in with the Yellow House, the expressionism of the brush strokes, and their contrast against often dark backgrounds.^[265]

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  Still Life: Vase with Irises Against a Yellow Background, May 1890, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam^[266]

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  Still Life: Pink Roses in a Vase, May 1890, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York^[266]

Cypresses and olives

Fifteen canvases depict cypresses, a tree he became fascinated with in Arles.^[267] He brought life to the trees, which were traditionally seen as emblematic of death.^[234] The series of cypresses he began in Arles featured the trees in the distance, as windbreaks in fields; when he was at Saint-Rémy he brought them to the foreground.^[268] Vincent wrote to Theo in May 1889: «Cypresses still preoccupy me, I should like to do something with them like my canvases of sunflowers»; he went on to say, «They are beautiful in line and proportion like an Egyptian obelisk.»^[269]

In mid-1889, and at his sister Wil’s request, Van Gogh painted several smaller versions of Wheat Field with Cypresses.^[270] The works are characterised by swirls and densely painted impasto, and include The Starry Night, in which cypresses dominate the foreground.^[267] In addition to this, other notable works on cypresses include Cypresses (1889), Cypresses with Two Figures (1889–90), and Road with Cypress and Star (1890).^[271]

During the last six or seven months of the year 1889, he had also created at least fifteen paintings of olive trees, a subject which he considered as demanding and compelling.^[272] Among these works are Olive Trees with the Alpilles in the Background (1889), about which in a letter to his brother Van Gogh wrote, «At last I have a landscape with olives».^[271] While in Saint-Rémy, Van Gogh spent time outside the asylum, where he painted trees in the olive groves. In these works, natural life is rendered as gnarled and arthritic as if a personification of the natural world, which are, according to Hughes, filled with «a continuous field of energy of which nature is a manifestation».^[234]

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  Cypresses in Starry Night, a reed pen drawing executed by Van Gogh after the painting in 1889.

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  Cypresses and Two Women, February 1890. Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, Netherlands

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  Cypresses, 1889. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Orchards

The Flowering Orchards (also the Orchards in Blossom) are among the first groups of work completed after Van Gogh’s arrival in Arles in February 1888. The 14 paintings are optimistic, joyous and visually expressive of the burgeoning spring. They are delicately sensitive and unpopulated. He painted swiftly, and although he brought to this series a version of Impressionism, a strong sense of personal style began to emerge during this period. The transience of the blossoming trees, and the passing of the season, seemed to align with his sense of impermanence and belief in a new beginning in Arles. During the blossoming of the trees that spring, he found «a world of motifs that could not have been more Japanese».^[273] Vincent wrote to Theo on 21 April 1888 that he had 10 orchards and «one big [painting] of a cherry tree, which I’ve spoiled».^[274]

During this period Van Gogh mastered the use of light by subjugating shadows and painting the trees as if they are the source of light – almost in a sacred manner.^[273] Early the following year he painted another smaller group of orchards, including View of Arles, Flowering Orchards.^[275] Van Gogh was enthralled by the landscape and vegetation of the south of France, and often visited the farm gardens near Arles. In the vivid light of the Mediterranean climate his palette significantly brightened.^[276]

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  Pink Peach Tree in Blossom (Reminiscence of Mauve), watercolour, March 1888. Kröller-Müller Museum

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  The Pink Orchard also Orchard with Blossoming Apricot Trees, March 1888. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

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  Orchard in Blossom, Bordered by Cypresses, April 1888. Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, Netherlands

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Wheat fields

Van Gogh made several painting excursions during visits to the landscape around Arles. He made paintings of harvests, wheat fields and other rural landmarks of the area, including The Old Mill (1888); a good example of a picturesque structure bordering the wheat fields beyond.^[125] At various points, Van Gogh painted the view from his window – at The Hague, Antwerp, and Paris. These works culminated in The Wheat Field series, which depicted the view from his cells in the asylum at Saint-Rémy.^[277]

Many of the late paintings are sombre but essentially optimistic and, right up to the time of Van Gogh’s death, reflect his desire to return to lucid mental health. Yet some of his final works reflect his deepening concerns.^[278][279] Writing in July 1890, from Auvers, Van Gogh said that he had become absorbed «in the immense plain against the hills, boundless as the sea, delicate yellow».^[196]

Van Gogh was captivated by the fields in May when the wheat was young and green. His Wheatfields at Auvers with White House shows a more subdued palette of yellows and blues, which creates a sense of idyllic harmony.^[280]

About 10 July 1890, Van Gogh wrote to Theo of «vast fields of wheat under troubled skies».^[281] Wheatfield with Crows shows the artist’s state of mind in his final days; Hulsker describes the work as a «doom-filled painting with threatening skies and ill-omened crows».^[199] Its dark palette and heavy brushstrokes convey a sense of menace.^[282]

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  Enclosed Wheat Field with Rising Sun, May 1889, Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo, Netherlands

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  Wheat Fields, early June 1889. Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo

Reputation and legacy

After Van Gogh’s first exhibitions in the late 1880s, his reputation grew steadily among artists, art critics, dealers and collectors.^[283] In 1887, André Antoine hung Van Gogh’s alongside works of Georges Seurat and Paul Signac, at the Théâtre Libre in Paris; some were acquired by Julien Tanguy.^[284] In 1889, his work was described in the journal Le Moderniste Illustré by Albert Aurier as characterised by «fire, intensity, sunshine».^[285] Ten paintings were shown at the Société des Artistes Indépendants, in Brussels in January 1890.^[286] French president Marie François Sadi Carnot was said to have been impressed by Van Gogh’s work.^[287]

After Van Gogh’s death, memorial exhibitions were held in Brussels, Paris, The Hague and Antwerp. His work was shown in several high-profile exhibitions, including six works at Les XX; in 1891 there was a retrospective exhibition in Brussels.^[286] In 1892, Octave Mirbeau wrote that Van Gogh’s suicide was an «infinitely sadder loss for art … even though the populace has not crowded to a magnificent funeral, and poor Vincent van Gogh, whose demise means the extinction of a beautiful flame of genius, has gone to his death as obscure and neglected as he lived.»^[284]

Theo died in January 1891, removing Vincent’s most vocal and well-connected champion.^[288] Theo’s widow Johanna van Gogh-Bonger was a Dutchwoman in her twenties who had not known either her husband or her brother-in-law very long and who suddenly had to take care of several hundreds of paintings, letters and drawings, as well as her infant son, Vincent Willem van Gogh.^{[283][note 14]} Gauguin was not inclined to offer assistance in promoting Van Gogh’s reputation, and Johanna’s brother Andries Bonger also seemed lukewarm about his work.^[283] Aurier, one of Van Gogh’s earliest supporters among the critics, died of typhoid fever in 1892 at the age of 27.^[290]

In 1892, Émile Bernard organised a small solo show of Van Gogh’s paintings in Paris, and Julien Tanguy exhibited his Van Gogh paintings with several consigned from Johanna van Gogh-Bonger. In April 1894, the Durand-Ruel Gallery in Paris agreed to take 10 paintings on consignment from Van Gogh’s estate.^[290] In 1896, the Fauvist painter Henri Matisse, then an unknown art student, visited John Russell on Belle Île off Brittany.^[291][292] Russell had been a close friend of Van Gogh; he introduced Matisse to the Dutchman’s work, and gave him a Van Gogh drawing. Influenced by Van Gogh, Matisse abandoned his earth-coloured palette for bright colours.^[292][293]

In Paris in 1901, a large Van Gogh retrospective was held at the Bernheim-Jeune Gallery, which excited André Derain and Maurice de Vlaminck, and contributed to the emergence of Fauvism.^[290] Important group exhibitions took place with the Sonderbund artists in Cologne in 1912, the Armory Show, New York in 1913, and Berlin in 1914.^[294] Henk Bremmer was instrumental in teaching and talking about Van Gogh,^[295] and introduced Helene Kröller-Müller to Van Gogh’s art; she became an avid collector of his work.^[296] The early figures in German Expressionism such as Emil Nolde acknowledged a debt to Van Gogh’s work.^[297] Bremmer assisted Jacob Baart de la Faille, whose catalogue raisonné L’Oeuvre de Vincent van Gogh appeared in 1928.^{[298][note 15]}
Van Gogh’s fame reached its first peak in Austria and Germany before World War I,^[301] helped by the publication of his letters in three volumes in 1914.^[302] His letters are expressive and literate, and have been described as among the foremost 19th-century writings of their kind.^[8] These began a compelling mythology of Van Gogh as an intense and dedicated painter who suffered for his art and died young.^[303] In 1934, the novelist Irving Stone wrote a biographical novel of Van Gogh’s life titled Lust for Life, based on Van Gogh’s letters to Theo.^[304] This novel and the 1956 film further enhanced his fame, especially in the United States where Stone surmised only a few hundred people had heard of Van Gogh prior to his surprise best-selling book.^[305][306]

In 1957, Francis Bacon based a series of paintings on reproductions of Van Gogh’s The Painter on the Road to Tarascon, the original of which was destroyed during the Second World War. Bacon was inspired by an image he described as «haunting», and regarded Van Gogh as an alienated outsider, a position which resonated with him. Bacon identified with Van Gogh’s theories of art and quoted lines written to Theo: «[R]eal painters do not paint things as they are … [T]hey paint them as they themselves feel them to be.»^[307]

Van Gogh’s works are among the world’s most expensive paintings. Those sold for over US$100 million (today’s equivalent) include Portrait of Dr Gachet,^[308] Portrait of Joseph Roulin and Irises. The Metropolitan Museum of Art acquired a copy of Wheat Field with Cypresses in 1993 for US$57 million by using funds donated by publisher, diplomat and philanthropist Walter Annenberg.^[309] In 2015, L’Allée des Alyscamps sold for US$66.3 million at Sotheby’s, New York, exceeding its reserve of US$40 million.^[310]

Minor planet 4457 van Gogh is named in his honour.^[311]

In October 2022, two activists protesting the effects of the fossil fuel industry on climate change threw a can of tomato soup on Van Gogh’s Sunflowers in the National Gallery, London, and then glued their hands to the gallery wall. As the painting was covered by glass it was not damaged. ^[312][313]

Van Gogh Museum

Van Gogh’s nephew and namesake, Vincent Willem van Gogh (1890–1978),^[314] inherited the estate after his mother’s death in 1925. During the early 1950s he arranged for the publication of a complete edition of the letters presented in four volumes and several languages. He then began negotiations with the Dutch government to subsidise a foundation to purchase and house the entire collection.^[315] Theo’s son participated in planning the project in the hope that the works would be exhibited under the best possible conditions. The project began in 1963; architect Gerrit Rietveld was commissioned to design it, and after his death in 1964 Kisho Kurokawa took charge.^[316] Work progressed throughout the 1960s, with 1972 as the target for its grand opening.^[314]

The Van Gogh Museum opened in the Museumplein in Amsterdam in 1973.^[317] It became the second most popular museum in the Netherlands, after the Rijksmuseum, regularly receiving more than 1.5 million visitors a year. In 2015 it had a record 1.9 million.^[318] Eighty-five percent of the visitors come from other countries.^[319]

Nazi-looted art

During the Nazi period (1933–1945) a great number of artworks by Van Gogh changed hands, many of them looted from Jewish collectors who were forced into exile or murdered. Some of these works have disappeared into private collections. Others have since resurfaced in museums, or at auction, or have been reclaimed, often in high-profile lawsuits, by their former owners.^[320] The German Lost Art Foundation still lists dozens of missing van Goghs^[321] and the American Alliance of Museums lists 73 van Goghs on the Nazi Era Provenance Internet Portal.^[322]

References

Footnotes

References

Sources

External links

• The Vincent van Gogh Gallery, the complete works and letters of Van Gogh
• Vincent van Gogh The letters, the complete letters of Van Gogh (translated into English and annotated)
• Vincent Van Gogh, teaching resource on Van Gogh
• Works by Vincent van Gogh at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about Vincent van Gogh at Internet Archive
• Works by Vincent van Gogh at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)

Wikimedia Foundation.
2010.

ВАН ГОГ (van Gogh) Вин­сент Вил­лем (30.3.1853, Грот-Зюн­дерт, пров. Сев. Бра­бант – 29.7.1890, Овер-сюр-Уаз, близ Па­ри­жа), голл. жи­во­пи­сец и ри­со­валь­щик. Ро­дил­ся в се­мье пас­то­ра; не по­лу­чил сис­те­ма­тич. об­ра­зо­ва­ния. В 1869–1876 слу­жил ко­мис­сио­не­ром в га­аг­ской фир­ме по про­да­же про­из­ве­де­ний ис­кус­ст­ва, по­се­тил Брюс­сель, Лон­дон и Па­риж; в 1876 пре­по­да­вал в шко­ле в Рамс­ги­те (Анг­лия). В 1877 обу­чал­ся в мис­сио­нер­ской шко­ле в Ла­ке­не (близ Брюс­се­ля), в 1878–79 за­ни­мал­ся про­по­вед­нич. дея­тель­но­стью сре­ди гор­ня­ков Бо­ри­на­жа (Бель­гия). В эти го­ды В. Г. осоз­нал своё при­зва­ние – стать ху­дож­ни­ком уни­жен­ных и обез­до­лен­ных, изо­бра­жая их тя­жёлый труд. Не­дол­го по­се­щал АХ в Брюс­се­ле (1880–81), в Гаа­ге поль­зо­вал­ся со­ве­та­ми жи­во­пис­ца А. Мау­ве (1882–83), здесь же по­лу­чил свой пер­вый и един­ст­вен­ный за­каз (12 ри­сун­ков ви­дов го­ро­да). Ра­бо­тал так­же в Дрен­те (1883), Ну­эне­не (1884–85), Ан­твер­пе­не (1885–1886), где по­се­щал АХ и ча­ст­ную шко­лу ри­сун­ка, изу­чал жи­во­пись Рем­бранд­та, П. П. Ру­бен­са и др. ста­рых мас­те­ров, по­зна­ко­мил­ся с япон. гра­вю­рой. В сво­их ри­сун­ках голл. пе­рио­да (все­го св. 1300) и жи­во­пис­ных ра­бо­тах (с 1882) В. Г. об­ра­щал­ся к изо­бра­же­нию су­ро­вой при­ро­ды и бы­та шах­тё­ров, зем­ле­дель­цев, бра­бант­ских тка­чей. Счи­тая се­бя про­дол­жа­те­лем тра­ди­ций реа­лиз­ма 19 в., пре­ж­де все­го ра­бот Ф. Мил­ле на кре­сть­ян­скую те­му, В. Г. дос­ти­гал, тем не ме­нее, во мн. по­лот­нах сим­во­ли­ст­ско­го обоб­ще­ния: ри­су­нок «Скорбь» (1882, ча­ст­ное со­б­ра­ние, Гаа­га), кар­ти­ны «Едо­ки кар­то­фе­ля» (1885, Му­зей Ван Го­га, Ам­стер­дам, и Му­зей Крёл­лер-Мюл­лер, От­тер­ло), так­же на­тюр­мор­ты, на­пи­сан­ные в су­мрач­ной жи­во­пис­ной гам­ме и на­де­лён­ные ре­лиг.-фи­лос. под­тек­стом («На­тюр­морт с от­кры­той Биб­ли­ей и по­гас­шей све­чой», 1885, Му­зей Ван Го­га, Ам­стер­дам).

Стре­ми­тель­ная эво­лю­ция твор­че­ст­ва В. Г. на­ча­лась по­сле его пе­ре­ез­да во Фран­цию. В 1886–88 он по­се­щал сту­дию Ф. Кор­мо­на в Па­ри­же, где по­зна­ко­мил­ся с А. де Ту­луз-Лот­ре­ком; изу­че­ние жи­во­пи­си Э. Де­лак­руа, А. Мон­ти­чел­ли, мас­те­ров им­прес­сио­низ­ма, нео­им­прес­сио­низ­ма и понт-авен­ской шко­лы (П. Го­ге­на и др.) уси­ли­ло ин­те­рес В. Г. к про­бле­мам ко­ло­ри­та, ком­по­зи­ции, экс­прес­сии маз­ка. В этот пе­ри­од па­лит­ра В. Г. ста­но­вит­ся свет­лой, ис­че­за­ют зем­ля­ные крас­ки, по­яв­ля­ют­ся чис­тые го­лу­бые, зо­ло­ти­сто-жёл­тые, ро­зо­вые, крас­ные то­на; са­мо­цен­ную вы­ра­зи­тель­ность при­об­ре­та­ет фак­ту­ра кар­тин – ди­на­мич­ный, стре­ми­тель­ный, как бы струя­щий­ся ма­зок (ви­ды Мон­мар­тра, ин­терь­е­ры рес­то­ра­нов, на­тюр­мор­ты, порт­ре­ты – в т. ч. «Па­па­ша Тан­ги», 1887, Му­зей Ро­де­на, Па­риж). Мно­же­ст­вен­ность ис­пы­тан­ных В. Г. влия­ний, его ин­те­рес к са­мым раз­ным яв­ле­ни­ям совр. иск-ва не­из­мен­но пре­тво­ре­ны в уни­каль­ный инди­ви­ду­аль­ный стиль.

Окон­ча­тель­ное свое­об­ра­зие творч. ма­не­ры ху­дож­ни­ка оп­ре­де­ли­лось в его «арль­ский пе­ри­од» (февр. 1888 – май 1889). Му­чи­тель­ный по­иск гар­мо­нии и кра­со­ты, – од­но­вре­мен­но по­дав­лен­ность и страх пе­ред вра­ж­деб­ны­ми че­ло­ве­ку си­ла­ми – на­хо­ди­ли во­пло­ще­ние то в про­ни­зан­ных сол­неч­ным све­том, сияю­щих чис­ты­ми крас­ка­ми пей­за­жах Про­ван­са и на­тюр­мор­тах («Цве­ту­щая сли­ва», 1887, Му­зей Ван Го­га, Ам­стер­дам; «Под­сол­ну­хи», 1888, там же и Но­вая пи­на­ко­те­ка, Мюн­хен), то в зло­ве­щих, на­по­ми­наю­щих ноч­ной кош­мар об­раз­ах («Ноч­ное ка­фе в Ар­ле», 1888, Ху­дож. га­ле­рея Йель­ско­го ун-та, Нью-Хей­вен). Ди­на­ми­ка цве­та и маз­ка оду­хо­тво­ря­ет не толь­ко при­ро­ду и лю­дей («Крас­ные ви­но­град­ни­ки в Ар­ле», 1888, ГМИИ, и др.), но и не­оду­шев­лён­ные пред­ме­ты («Спаль­ня Ван Го­га в Ар­ле», 1888, Му­зей Ван Го­га, Ам­стер­дам). Жи­во­пис­ная сис­те­ма этих про­из­ве­де­ний по­строе­на на со­че­та­ни­ях яр­ких цве­тов, вы­ра­зит. рит­ме ри­сун­ка и сме­лых, сво­бод­ных ком­по­зи­ци­он­ных ре­ше­ни­ях. В кон. 1888 В. Г. в Ар­ле по­се­тил П. Го­ген; о дра­ма­тич. раз­ры­ве ме­ж­ду ху­дож­ни­ка­ми по­ве­ст­ву­ют по­лот­на «Крес­ло Го­ге­на» (1888, Му­зей Ван Го­га, Ам­стер­дам) и ав­то­порт­ре­ты В. Г. («Ав­то­порт­рет с пе­ре­вя­зан­ным ухом», 1889, со­б­ра­ние Ли Б. Блок, Чи­ка­го и Ин-т Кур­то, Лон­дон).

На­пря­жён­ная ра­бо­та В. Г. в по­след­ние го­ды жиз­ни со­про­во­ж­да­лась при­сту­па­ми де­прес­сии, ко­то­рая при­ве­ла его в кли­ни­ку для ду­шев­но­боль­ных в Ар­ле (фев­раль–май 1889), за­тем в Сен-Ре­ми-де-Про­ванс (май 1889 – май 1890) и в Овер-сюр-Уаз (май–июль 1890). Твор­че­ст­во двух по­след­них лет жиз­ни от­ме­че­но экс­та­тич. одер­жи­мо­стью, пре­дель­но обо­ст­рён­ной экс­прес­си­ей цве­то­вых со­че­та­ний, рез­ки­ми сме­на­ми на­строе­ния – от ис­сту­п­лён­но­го от­чая­ния и мрач­но­го ви­зио­нер­ст­ва, сбли­жаю­ще­го его с сим­во­лиз­мом («Про­гул­ка за­клю­чён­ных» по мо­ти­вам гра­вю­ры Г. До­ре, 1890, ГМИИ; «До­ро­га с ки­па­ри­са­ми и звёз­да­ми», 1890, Му­зей Крёл­лер-Мюл­лер, От­тер­ло; «Во­ро­ны в пше­нич­ном по­ле», 1890, Му­зей Ван Го­га, Ам­стер­дам), до тре­пет­но­го чув­ст­ва про­свет­ле­ния и уми­ро­тво­ре­ния («Пей­заж в Ове­ре по­сле до­ж­дя», 1890, ГМИИ). В боль­шой се­рии его ав­то­порт­ре­тов, как и в зна­ме­ни­тых пись­мах к бра­ту Тео Ван Го­гу (1857–1891) и не­мно­гим друзь­ям (из­да­ны в 4 тт., 1952–54), от­ра­зи­лись бо­лез­нен­но-му­чи­тель­ные по­ис­ки ду­хов­ных, нрав­ст­вен­ных цен­но­стей. Во вре­мя оче­ред­но­го при­сту­па бо­лез­ни 27.7.1890 ху­дож­ник на­нёс се­бе смер­тель­ное ог­не­стрель­ное ра­не­ние.

Твор­че­ст­во В. Г. от­ра­зи­ло слож­ней­ший пе­ре­лом­ный мо­мент в ху­дож. куль­ту­ре кон. 19 в., со­ци­аль­ную дра­му но­во­го иск-ва. Глу­бо­ко лич­но­ст­ное ми­ро­вос­прия­тие и тра­гич. па­фос, вы­ра­жен­ные в его про­из­ве­де­ни­ях, оп­ре­де­ли­ли осо­бое ме­сто В. Г. в иск-ве пост­им­прес­сио­низ­ма и ока­за­ли зна­чит. воз­дей­ст­вие на аван­гар­дизм 20 в. (в ча­ст­но­сти, на мас­те­ров франц. фо­виз­ма и нем. экс­прес­сио­низ­ма).

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Голландский художник-постимпрессионист

Винсент Ван Гог
Автопортрет, 1887, Художественный институт Чикаго
Родился	Винсент Виллем Ван Гог. 30 марта 1853. Зундерт, Нидерланды
Умер	29 июля 1890 (1890-07-29) (37 лет). Овер-сюр-Уаз, Франция
Причина смерти	Самоубийство в результате огнестрельного оружия
Место упокоения	Cimetière d’Auvers-sur- Уаз, Франция. 49 ° 04’31 «N, 2 ° 10’44» E / 49,07531 ° N, 2,17894 ° E / 49,07531; 2.17894
Национальность	Голландец
Образование	Антон Маув
Известен	Живопись, рисунок
Известные работы	Печаль (1882). Едоки картофеля (1885). Подсолнухи (1887). Спальня в Арле (1888). Звездная ночь (1889). Портрет доктора Гаше (1890). Пшеничное поле с воронами (1890)
Движение	Постимпрессионизм

Подсолнухи (F.458), повторение 4-й версии (желтый фон), август 1889 г. Музей Ван Гога, Амстердам Пшеничное поле с воронами, 1890. Ван Музей Гога, Амстердам

Винсент Виллем Ван Гог (голландский: ( слушайте ); 30 марта 1853 г. — 29 июля 1890 г.) был голландским художником-постимпрессионистом, который входит в число самых известных и влиятельных фигур в истории западного искусства. Чуть более чем за десять лет он создал около 2100 произведений искусства, в том числе около 860 картин маслом, самых из которых к последним двум годам его жизни. Среди них пейзажи, натюрморты, портреты и автопортреты, они отличаются яркими красками и драматичными, импульсивными и выразительными живопись, положившая начало современному искусству. Он не имел коммерческого успеха, и его самоубийство произошло после многих лет психических заболеваний, депрессии и бедности.

Родившийся в семье среднего класса, Ван Гог рисовал в детстве и был серьезным, тихим и задумчивым. В молодости он работал торговцем произведениями искусства, часто путешествовал, но после перевода в Лондон впал в депрессию. Он обратился к религии и провел время как протестантский миссионер на юге Бельгии. Он скитался по нездоровью и одиночеству, прежде чем заняться живописью в 1881 году, вернувшись домой с родителями. Его младший брат Тео поддерживал его финансово, и эти двое великие долгую переписку письмом. Его ранние работы, в основном натюрморты и изображения крестьянских рабочих, содержат мало признаков яркого цвета, который отличал его более поздние работы. В 1886 году он переехал в Париж, где познакомился с представителем авангарда, включая Эмиля Бернара и Поля Гогена, которые выступали против Импрессионист чуткость. По мере развития своего творчества он создавал новый подход к натюрмортам и местным пейзажам. Его ярче по цвету, поскольку он разработал стиль, который полностью реализовался во время его пребывания в Арле на юге Франции в 1888 году. В этот период он расширил свой предмет, включив серию оливковых деревьев, пшеничные поля и подсолнухи.

Ван Гог страдал от психотических эпизодов и бреда, и хотя он беспокоился о своей психической устойчивости, он часто пренебрегал своим физическим здоровьем, плохо ел и много пил. Его дружба с Гогеном закончилась после столкновения с бритвой, когда он в ярости отрезал часть своего левого уха. Он провел время в психиатрических больницах, в том числе в Сен-Реми. После того, как он выписался и переехал в Оберж Раву в Овер-сюр-Уаз недалеко от Парижа, он попал под опеку гомеопатического врача Пола. Гаше. Его депрессия продолжалась, и 27 июля 1890 года Ван Гог выстрелил себе в грудь из револьвера Лефошо. Через два дня он скончался от полученных травм.

Ван Гог не добился успеха при жизни, и его считали сумасшедшим и неудачником. Он стал известен после самоубийства и существует в общественном воображении как непонятый гений, художник, «где сходятся дискурсы о безумии и творчестве». Его репутация начала расти в начале 20 века, когда элементы его стиля живописи были включены фовистами и немецкими экспрессионистами. В последующие десятилетия он добился широкого критического, коммерческого и популярного успеха, и его помнят как важного, но трагического художника, чья-то беспокойная личность, олицетворяет романтический идеал истерзанного художника. Сегодня работы Ван Гога входят в число самых дорогих картин в мире, которые когда-либо были проданы, и его наследие почитается музеем его имени Музеем Ван Гога в Амстердаме., в котором хранится самая большая в мире коллекция его картин и рисунков.

Содержание

• 1 Письма
• 2 Жизнь
  • 2.1 Ранние годы
  • 2.2 Эттен, Дренте и Гаага
  • 2.3 Молодой художник
    • 2.3.1 Нюэнен и Антверпен (1883–1886)
    • 2.3.2 Париж (1886–1888)
  • 2.4 Художественный прорыв
    • 2.4.1 Арль (1888–89)
    • 2.4.2 Визит Гогена (1888)
    • 2.4.3 Больница в Арле ( Декабрь 1888 г.)
    • 2.4.4 Сен-Реми (май 1889 г. — май 1890 г.)
    • 2.4.5 Овер-сюр-Уаз (май — июль 1890 г.)
  • 2.5 Смерть
• 3 Стиль и творчество
  • 3.1 Художественное развитие
  • 3.2 Основная серия
    • 3.2.1 Портреты
    • 3.2.2 Автопортреты
    • 3.2.3 Цветы
    • 3.2.4 Кипарисы и маслины
    • 3.2.5 Сады
    • 3.2.6 Пшеничные поля
• 4 Репутация и наследие
  • 4.1 Музей Ван Гога
• 5 Ссылки
  • 5.1 Сноски
  • 5.2 Цитаты
  • 5.3 Источники
• 6 Внешние ссылки

Письма

Наиболее полным первоисточником о Ван Гоге является переписка между ним и его младшим братом Тео. Их дружба на протяжении всей жизни и большая часть того, что известно о мыслях и теориях Винсента об искусстве, зафиксировано в сотняхем, они обменивались с 1872 по 1890 годы. Тео Ван Гог был торговцем произведений искусства и оказал своему брату финансовую и эмоциональную поддержку. как доступ к влиятельным людям на современном искусстве.

Винсент Ван Гог в 1873 году, когда он работал в галерее Goupil Cie в Гааге ; Тео (на фото справа, 1878 год) был пожизненным сторонником и другом своего брата.

Тео хранил все письма Винсента к нему; Винсент хранил несколько полученных писем. После того, как оба умерли, вдова Тео Джоанна организовала публикацию некоторых из их писем. Некоторые появились в 1906 и 1913 годах; большинство из них были опубликованы в 1914 году. Письма Винсента красноречивы и выразительны, описывались как имеющие «дневниковую близость» и читались частями, например, автобиографией. Переводчик Арнольд Померанс писал, что их публикация художественная мер «новое измерение в понимании качественных достижений Ван Гога, понимание, которое нам практически никто другой художник».

Их больше, чем 600 писем от Винсента Тео и около 40 писем от Тео Винсенту. 22 его сестре Уил, 58 художнику Антону ван Раппарду, 22 Эмилю Бернару, а также отдельные письма Полу Синьяку, Поль Гоген и критик Альбер Орье. Некоторые проиллюстрированы эскизами. Многие из них не датированы, но историки искусства находятся в порядке из них в хронологическом. Проблемы с транскрипцией и датировкой остаются, в основном теми, которые были отправлены из Арля. Там Винсент написал около 200 писем на голландском, французском и английском языках. В торговле есть пробел, когда он жил в Париже, поскольку братья жили вместе и не нуждались в переписке.

Жизнь

Ранние годы

Винсент Виллем Ван Гог родился 30 марта 1853 г. в семье голландской реформатской церкви в Грут-Зундерт, в преимущественно католической провинции Северный Брабант в Нидерландах. Он был самым старшим из выживших детей Теодора Ван Гога, служителя голландской реформатской церкви, и Анны Корнелии Карбентус. Ван Гогу дали имя своего деда и мертворожденного брата ровно за год до его рождения. Винсент был обычным именем в семье Ван Гогов: его дед Винсент (1789–1874), получивший степень богословия в Лейденском университете в 1811 году, имел шестерых сыновей, трое из стали деятелями искусства. дилеры. Этот Винсент, возможно, был назван в честь его двоюродного дедушки, скульптора (1729–1802).

Мать Ван Гога происходила из зажиточной семьи в Гааге, а его отец был младший сын министра. Они встретились, когда младшая сестра Анны, Корнелия, вышла замуж за старшего брата Теодора Винсента (Сент). Родители Ван Гога поженились в мае 1851 года и переехали в Зундерт. Его брат Тео родился 1 мая 1857 года. Был еще один брат, Кор, и три сестры: Элизабет, Анна и Виллемина (известная как «Вил»). В дальнейшем Ван Гог оставался на связи только с Виллеминой и Тео. Мать Ван Гога была суровой и религиозной женщиной, которая подчеркивала важность семьи, вызывая у окружающих клаустрофобию. Заработок Феодора был скромным, но Церковь снабжала семью домом, служанкой, двумя поварами, садовником, экипажем и лошадью, а Анна прививала детям долгое поддержание социальное положение семьи.

Ван Гог был серьезным и вдумчивым ребенком. Его учили дома мать и гувернантка, а в 1860 году его отправили в сельскую школу. В 1864 году его поместили в школу-интернат в Зевенбергене, где он чувствовал себя брошенным, и он начал кампанию, чтобы вернуться домой. Вместо этого в 1866 году родители отправили его в среднюю школу в Тилбурге, где он был глубоко несчастен. Его интерес к искусству начался в юном возрасте. В детстве мать наплала его рисовать, и его ранние рисунки выразительны, но не приближаются его более поздних работ. Константин Корнелис Хейсманс, который был успешным художником в Париже, учил студенты в Тилбурге. Его философия заключалась в отказе от техники в пользу фиксации впечатлений от вещей, особенно от природы или обычных вещей. Глубокое несчастье Ван Гога, кажется, омрачило уроки, которые не имели большого эффекта. В марте 1868 года он резко вернулся домой. Позже он писал, что его юность была «суровой, холодной и бесплодной».

В июле 1869 года дядя Ван Гога Сент получил для него должность в торговом центре Goupil Cie в Гааге.. После завершения обучения в 1873 году он был переведен в лондонский Гупила на Саутгемптон-стрит и поселился по адресу 87 Hackford Road, Stockwell. Это было счастливое время для Ван Гога; он был успешным на работе и в 20 лет зарабатывал больше, чем его отец. Жена Тео позже отметила, что это был лучший год в жизни Винсента. Он увлекся дочерью своей хозяйки, Эжени Луайе, но был отвергнут после признания в своих чувствах; она была тайно помолвлена ​​с бывшим квартирантом. Он стал более изолированным и религиозным. Фирма превратила его в переезд в Париж в 1875 году, когда он возмутился такими проблемами, как степень, в которой фирма превратилась в товар, и уволен годом позже.

дом Ван Гога в Кесмесе ; находясь там, он решил стать художником

. В апреле 1876 года он вернулся в Англию, чтобы устроиться на неоплачиваемую работу учителем снабжения в маленькой школе-интернате в Рамсгейте. Когда владелец переехал в Айлворт в Мидлсексе, Ван Гог пошел с ним. Договоренность не сработала, и он ушел, чтобы стать методистским помощником министра. Его родители тем временем переехали в Эттен ; в 1876 году он вернулся домой на Рождество на шесть месяцев и устроился работать в книжный магазин в Дордрехте. Он был недоволен своим положением и тратил время на рисование или перевод отрывков из Библии на английский, французский и немецкий языки. Он погрузился в религию и стал все более набожным и монашеским. По словам его соседа по квартире того времени, Паулюса ван Гёрлица, Ван Гог ел умеренно, избегая мяса.

Чтобы поддержать его желание стать пастором, в 1877 году семья отправила его жить к дядеждения. Йоханнес Стрикер, уважаемый теолог, в Амстердаме. Ван Гог готовился к вступительным экзаменам по богословию Амстердамского университета ; он провалил экзамен и покинул дом своего дяди в июле 1878 года. Он прошел, но и проиграл, трехмесячный курс в протестантской миссионерской школе в Лакене, недалеко от Брюсселя.

В январе 1879 года он занял должность миссионера в Пети-Васмес в угледобывающем районе Боринаж в Бельгии. Чтобы выразить поддержку своей обедневшей общине, он отказался от удобного жилья в пекарне бездомному и перебрался в небольшую хижину, где спал на соломе. Его убогие жилищные условия не вызывали у него любви к церковным властям, которые уволили его за «посягательство на достоинство священного священства». Затем он прошел 75 километров (47 миль) до Брюсселя, ненадолго вернулся в Cuesmes в Боринаже, но уступил давлению родителей, чтобы тот вернулся домой в Эттен. Он был там примерно до марта 1880 года, вызвало беспокойство его родителей. Его отец был особенно расстроен и посоветовал отправить сына в сумасшедший дом в Гиле.

Ван Гог вернулся в Кесмес в августе 1880 года, где он поселился у шахтера до октября. Он заинтересовался людьми и сценами вокруг него и записал их на рисунках после того, как Тео посоветовал ему серьезно заняться искусством. Позже в том же году он отправился в Брюссель, следуя рекомендации Тео, чтобы он учился у голландского художника Вилл Рулофса, который убедил его — несмотря на его неприязнь к формальным школам искусства — посетить Королевская академия изящных искусств. Он зарегистрировался в Академии в ноябре 1880 года, где изучал анатомию и стандартные правила моделирования и перспективы.

Эттен, Дренте и Гаага

Ки Вос-Стрикер с ее сыном Яном. c. 1879–80

Ван Гог вернулся в Эттен в апреле 1881 года, чтобы надолго остаться с родителями. Он продолжал рисовать, используя часто своих соседей в качестве сюжетов. В августе 1881 года его недавно овдовевшая двоюродная сестра Корнелия «Ки» Вос-Стрикер, дочь старшей сестры его матери Виллемины и Йоханнеса Стрикера, приехала с визитом. Он был в восторге и долго гулял с ней. Ки был на семь лет старше его и имел восьмилетнего сына. Ван Гог удивил всех, признавшись ей в любви и сделав предложение руки и сердца. Она отказалась, сказав «Нет, нет, никогда» («ноит, нин, ниммер»). После возвращения Ки в Амстердам Ван Гог отправился в Гаагу, чтобы попытаться продать картину и со своим троюродным братом Антоном Мауве. Мауве был успешным художником, стремился стать Ван Гог. Маув пригласил его через несколько месяцев и провести промежуточное время, углем и пастелью ; Ван Гог вернулся к Эттену и последовал этому совету.

В конце ноября 1881 года Ван Гог написал письмо Йоханнесу Стриккеру, которое он описал Тео как нападение. Через несколько дней он уехал в Амстердам. Ки не хотела с ним встречаться, а ее родители писали, что его «настойчивость отвратительна». В отчаянии он держал левую руку в пламени лампы со словами: «Дай мне увидеть ее, пока я могу держать руку в пламени». Он не очень хорошо помнил это событие, но предположил, что его дядя задул пламя. Отец Ки ясно дал понять, что к ее отказу прислушаться и что они не поженятся, в основном из-за неспособности Ван Гога содержать себя.

Маув взял Ван Гога в качестве студента и познакомил его с акварелью, которая он работал в течение следующего месяца, прежде чем вернуться домой на Рождество. Он поссорился с отцом, отказавшись посещать церковь, и уехал в Гаагу. В январе 1882 года Маув познакомил его с живописью маслом и одолжил ему денег на создание студии. Через месяц Ван Гог и Маув поссорились, возможно, из-за возможности рисования с гипсовых слепков. Ван Гог мог себе нанимать в качестве моделей только людей с улицы, что, по-предположительно, не одобряло Мауве. В июне Ван Гог перенес приступ гонореи и провел три недели в больнице. Вскоре после этого он впервые написал маслом, купленным на деньги, взятые в долг у Тео. Ему понравился материал, и он обильно распределил краску, соскребая с холста и снова кистью. Он написал, что был удивлен хорошими результатами.

Крыши, вид из ателье Гаага, 1882 г., частная коллекция

К марту 1882 г. Маув, похоже, остыл к Ван Гогу, и он перестал отвечать. к его письмам. Он узнал о новом домашнем соглашении Ван Гога с проституткой-алкоголиком Класиной Марией «Сиен» Хорник (1850–1904) и ее маленькой дочерью. Ван Гогился с Сиен в конце января 1882 года, когда у нее была пятилетняя дочь и она была беременна. Ранее она родила двоих детей, которые умерли, но Ван Гог не знал об этом; 2 июля она родила мальчика Виллема. Когда отец Ван Гога узнал подробности их отношений, он оказал давление на сына, чтобы тот бросил Сиен и ее двоих детей. Винсент сначала сопротивлялся ему и рассматривал возможность переезда семьи из города, но в конце 1883 года он оставил Сиен и детей.

Бедность, возможно, подтолкнула Сиен к проституции; дом стал менее счастливым, и Ван Гог, возможно, чувствовал, что семейная жизнь несовместима с его художественным развитием. Сиен отдала дочь матери и ребенка Виллема брату. Виллем вспомнил, как посетил Роттердам, когда ему было около 12 лет, когда дядя пытался убедить Сиен выйти замуж, чтобы узаконить ребенка. Он считал, что Ван Гог был его отцом, но время его рождения делает это маловероятным. Сиен утонула в реке Шельда в 1904 году.

В сентябре 1883 года Ван Гог переехал в Дренте на севере Нидерландов. В декабре, движимый одиночеством, он уехал жить к своим родителям, затем в Нюэнен, Северный Брабант.

Молодой художник

Нюэнен и Антверпен (1883–1886)

Едоки картофеля, 1885. Музей Ван Гога, Амстердам

В Нюэнене Ван Гог сосредоточился на живописи и рисунке. Работая на улице и очень быстро, он выполнил наброски и рисунки ткачей и их дачи. Ван Гог также завершил Сад пасторства в Нюэнене, который был украден у певца Ларена в марте 2020 года. С августа 1884 года к нему присоединилась Марго Бегеманн, дочь соседа на десять лет старше его. о его набегах; она влюбилась, и он ответил взаимностью, хотя и с меньшим энтузиазмом. Они хотели пожениться, но ни одна из сторон их семей не одобряла их. Марго обезумела и приняла передозировку стрихнина, но выжила после того, как Ван Гог срочно доставил ее в ближайшую больницу. 26 марта 1885 года его отец умер от сердечного приступа.

Ван Гог написал несколько групп натюрмортов в 1885 году. Во время своего двухлетнего пребывания в Нуэнене он выполнил множество рисунков и акварели и около 200 картин маслом. Его палитра состояла в основном из мрачных землистых тонов, особенно темно-коричневого, и не было никаких признаков ярких цветов, которые отличали его более поздние работы.

В начале 1885 года был интерес со стороны торговца в Париже. были картины, готовые к выставке. В мае Ван Гог ответил своей первой крупной работой Едоки картофеля и серией «исследований характера крестьян «, которые стали кульминацией нескольких лет работы. Когда он пожаловался, что Тео не прилагает достаточно усилий для продажи своих картин в Париже, его брат ответил, что они слишком темные и не соответствуют яркому стилю импрессионизма. В августе его работы впервые были выставлены на всеобщее обозрение в витринах дилера Leurs в Гааге. Одна из его молодых крестьянских натурщиц забеременела в сентябре 1885 г.; Ван Гога обвинили в том, что он навязался ей, и деревенский священник запретил прихожанам моделировать для него.

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  Worn Out,карандаш на акварельной бумаге, 1882 г. Музей Ван Гога, Амстердам

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  Натюрморт с открытой Библией, Погашенная свеча и роман также Натюрморт с Библией, 1885. Музей Ван Гога, Амстердам

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  Череп скелета с горящей сигаретой, 1885–86. Музей Ван Гога, Амстердам

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  Крестьянка, копающая землю, или Женщина с лопатой, вид сзади, 1885. Художественная галерея Онтарио, Торонто

В ноябре того же года он переехал в Антверпен и снял комнату наверху магазин красок на улице де Изображений (Lange Beeldekensstraat). Он в бедности и плохо питался, предпочитая тратить деньги на отправленные Тео деньги на материалы для рисования и модели. Хлеб, кофе и табак его стали продуктов питания. В феврале 1886 года он написал Тео, что с мая прошлого года ел только шесть горячих блюд. Его зубы расшатались и стали болеть. В Антверпене он занялся изучением теории цвета и проводил время в музеях — в частности, изучая работы Питера Пауля Рубенса — и расширил свою палитру, включив в него кармин, синий кобальт и изумрудно-зеленый. Ван Гог купил японские гравюры на дереве укиё-э в доках, позже включив элементы их стиля в фон некоторых своих картин. Он снова много пил и был госпитализирован в период с февраля по март 1886 года, когда он, возможно, лечился от сифилиса.

. После выздоровления, несмотря на его антипатию к академическому преподаванию, он сдал вступительные экзамены более высокого уровня в Академия изящных искусств в Антверпене, в 1886 году поступила в школу живописи и рисунка. Он заболел и устал от переутомления, плохого питания и чрезмерного курения. Он начал посещать классы рисования после гипсовых моделей в Антверпенской академии 18 января 1886 года. У него быстро начались проблемы с Шарлем Верлатом, директором Академии и преподавателем класса живописи, из-за его нетрадиционной живописи. стиль. Ван Гог также столкнулся с преподавателем класса рисования Францем Винком. Ван Гог наконец начал посещать уроки рисования после старинных гипсовых моделей, дал которые Эжен Сибердт. Вскоре Сибердт и Ван Гог вступили в конфликт, когда последний не выполнил требования Сибердта о том, чтобы рисунки выражали контур и концентрировались на линии. Когда Ван Гогу потребовали нарисовать Венеру Милосскую во время урока рисования, он изобразил обнаженный торс фламандской крестьянки без конечностей. Сибердт расценил это как вызов своему художественному руководству и так энергично исправил рисунок Ван Гога, что порвал бумагу. Тогда Ван Гог пришел в ярость и закричал на Сибердта: «Ты явно не знаешь, что такое молодая женщина, черт возьми! У женщины должны быть бедра, ягодицы, таз, в котором она может вынашивать ребенка! »По некоторым данным, это был последний раз, когда Ван Гог посещал занятия в Академии, а позже он уехал в Париж. 31 марта 1886 года, то есть примерно через месяц после противостояния с Сибердтом, преподаватели Академии решили, что 17 студентов, включая Ван Гога, должны повторить год. Таким образом, история о том, что Ван Гог был исключен из Академии Сибердтом, необоснованна.

Париж (1886–1888)

Анри де Тулуз-Лотрек, Портрет Винсента Ван Гога, 1887 г., рисунок пастелью, Музей Ван Гога, Амстердам Джон Питер Рассел нарисовал эти пять этюдов Ван Гога примерно через год после того, как написал его портрет 1886 года (этюды, Картинная галерея Нью-Йорка). Южный Уэльс, Сидней).

Ван Гог переехал в Париж в марте 1886 года, где он жил в квартире Тео на улице Лаваль на Монмартре и учился в студии Фернана Кормона. В июне братья сняли квартиру побольше по адресу 54 rue Lepic. В Париже Винсент писал портреты друзей и знакомых, натюрморты, виды Мулен де ла Галетт, сцены Монмартра, Аньер и вдоль Сены. В 1885 году в Антверпене он заинтересовался японскими гравюрами укиё-э на дереве и использовал их для украшения стен своей мастерской; находясь в Париже, он собрал их сотни. Он попробовал свои силы в Japonaiserie, начертил фигуру с репродукции на обложке журнала Paris Illustre, Куртизанка или Ойран (1887), после Кейсай Эйзен, который он графически увеличил в картине.

Увидев портрет Адольфа Монтичелли в Galerie Delareybarette, Ван Гог принял более яркую палитру и более смелую атаку, особенно в таких картинах. как его Морской пейзаж в Сент-Мари (1888). Два года спустя Винсент и Тео заплатили за публикацию книги о картинах Монтичелли, и Винсент купил несколько работ Монтичелли, чтобы добавить в свою коллекцию.

Ван Гог узнал о Фернане Кормоне ателье от Тео. В апреле и мае 1886 года он работал в мастерской, где часто бывал в кружке австралийского художника Джона Питера Рассела, написавшего свой портрет в 1886 году. Ван Гог также встречался с сокурсниками Эмиль Бернар, Луи Анкетен и Анри де Тулуз-Лотрек, которые написали его портрет пастелью. Они встретились в малярной мастерской Жюльена «Пер» (в то время это было единственное место, где выставлялись картины Поля Сезанна ). В 1886 году здесь были устроены две большие выставки, впервые показавшие Пуантилизм и Неоимпрессионизм и привлекшие внимание к Жоржу Сёра и Полю Синьяку. Тео держал запас картин импрессионистов в своей галерее на бульваре Монмартр, но Ван Гог не спешил признавать новые достижения в искусстве.

Между братьями возникли конфликты. В конце 1886 года Тео обнаружил, что жить с Винсентом «почти невыносимо». К началу 1887 года они снова были в мире, и Винсент переехал в Аньер, северо-западный пригород Парижа, где он познакомился с Синьяком. Он перенял элементы пуантилизма, техники, с помощью которой холст создает множество маленьких цветных точек, так что при взгляде издалека они оптическую смесь оттенков. Стиль подчеркивает способность дополнительных цветов, включая синий и оранжевый, создавать яркие контрасты.

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  Ле Мулен де Блю-Фин (1886) из Ле Мулен де ла Галетт и Монмартр серия ». Художественный музей Бриджстоун, Токио (F273)

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  Куртизанка (после Эйзена ), 1887. Музей Ван Гога, Амстердам

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  Портрет Пера Танги, 1887 год. Музей Родена, Париж

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  Натюрморт со стаканом абсента и графином, 1887. Музей Ван Гога, Амстердам

В то время как в Аньер Ван Гог писал парки, рестораны и Сена, включая мосты через Сену в Аньер. В ноябре 1887 года Тео и Винсент подружились с Полем Гогеном, только что прибывшим в Париж. К концу года Винсент организовал выставку вместе с Бернаром, Анкетеном и, вероятно, Тулуз-Лотреком, в ресторане Grand-Bouillon du Chalet, 43 авеню де Клиши, Монмартр. В рассказе современника Бернар написал, что выставка опередила все остальное в Париже. Там Бернар и Анкетен продали свои первые картины, а Ван Гог обменялся работами с Гогеном. Во время выставки начались дискуссии об искусстве, художниках и их социальном положении, которые продолжились и расширились, включив посетителей выставки, таких как Камиль Писсарро и его сын Люсьен, Синьяк и Сёра. В феврале 1888 года Ван Гог, измученный жизнью в Париже, уехал, написав более 200 картин за два года пребывания там. За несколько часов до отъезда в сопровождении Тео он и первый раз посетил Сёра в своей мастерской.

Художественный прорыв

Арль (1888–89)

Желтый Дом, 1888. Музей Ван Гога, Амстердам

Больной от алкоголя и кашель курильщика, в феврале 1888 года Ван Гог нашел убежище в Арле. Похоже, у него возникли мысли об основании художественной колонии. Датский художник Кристиан Мурье-Петерсен стал его спутником на два месяца, и сначала Арль казался экзотикой. В письме он описал это как чужую страну: «Зуавы, публичные дома, очаровательная маленькая Арлезьен, идущая на свое первое причастие, священник в своем убранстве, который выглядит как опасный носорог, люди пьющий абсент, все кажутся мне существами из другого мира ».

Время в Арле стало одним из наиболее плодотворных периодов Ван Гога: он завершил 200 картин и более 100 рисунков и акварелей. Он был очарован новыми именами и светом; его работы этого периода насыщены желтым, ультрамариновым и лиловым. Его картины включают пшеничные поля и общие сельские достопримечательности из этого района, в том числе «Старую мельницу» (1888 г.), живописное сооружение, граничащее с пшеничными полями. Это было одно из семи полотен, отправленных Пон-Авену 4 октября 1888 года в обмен работами с Полем Гогеном, Эмилем Бернаром, Шарлем Лавалем и другими.

Образы Арля основаны на голландском воспитании Ван Гога; мозаика полей и проспектов кажется плоской и лишенной перспективы, но превосходно использует цвет. Его вновь обретенная признанная видна в диапазоне и объеме его работы. В марте 1888 года он писал пейзажи, используя сетчатую «перспективную рамку»; три работы экспонировались на ежегодной выставке Société des Artistes Indépendants. В апреле его посетил американский художник Додж Макнайт, который жил в Фонвьей. 1 мая 1888 года за 15 франков в месяц он подписал договор об аренде восточного крыла Желтого дома на 2-м месте Ламартин. В комнатах не было мебели и в течение нескольких месяцев никто не жил.

7 мая Ван Гог переехал из отеля Carrel в Café de la Gare, подружившись с его владельцами, Джозефом и Мари Жину. Желтый дом нужно было обставить, прежде чем он смог полностью заселиться, но он смог использовать его как студию. Он хотел, чтобы в галерее выставлялись его работы, и начал серию картин, которые в итоге включали кресло Ван Гога (1888), спальню в Арле (1888), ночное кафе (1888 г.), Ночная терраса кафе (сентябрь 1888 г.), Звездная ночь над Роной (1888 г.) и Натюрморт: ваза с двенадцатью подсолнухами (1888), все предназначено для украшения Желтого дома.

Ван Гог писал, что с помощью «Ночного кафе» он пытался «выразить идею о том, что кафе — это место, где можно испортиться, сойти с ума или совершить преступление ». Когда он посетил Сент-Мари-де-ла-Мер в июне, он давал уроки второму лейтенанту зуавов — Полю-Эжену Милье — и рисовал лодки на море. и деревня. Макнайт познакомил Ван Гога с Эженом Бохом, бельгийским художником, который иногда останавливался в Фонвьей, и они обменялись визитами в июле.

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  Сеятель с заходящим солнцем, 1888. Музей Ван Гога, Амстердам

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  Рыбацкие лодки на пляже в Сент-Мари, июнь 1888 года. Музей Ван Гога, Амстердам

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  Спальня в Арле, 1888 год. Музей Ван Гога, Амстердам

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  Старая мельница, 1888 год. Олбрайт-Нокс Художественная галерея, Буффало, Нью-Йорк

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  Пахарь на полях возле Арля (1888), Национальная художественная галерея, Вашингтон, округ Колумбия Ван Гог не переставал рисовать ни в одном периоде своей творческой жизни.

Визит Гогена (1888)

Поль Гоген, Живописец подсолнухов : Портрет Винсента Ван Гога, 1888. Музей Ван Гога, Амстердам

Когда Гоген согласился посетить Арль В 1888 году Ван Гог надеялся на дружбу и реализацию своей идеи творческого коллектива. В ожидании, в августе написал Подсолнухи. Когда Бох снова приехал в гости, Ван Гог написал его портрет, а также исследование «Поэт на фоне звездного неба».

Готовясь к приезду Гогена, Ван Гог купил две кровати по совету начальника почтовой службы станции. 699>Жозеф Рулен, портрет которого он написал. 17 сентября он провел первую ночь в еще мало обставленном Желтом доме. Когда Гоген согласился работать и жить с ним в Арле, Ван Гог начал работать над Украшением для Желтого дома, вероятно, самым амбициозным усилием, которое он когда-либо предпринимал. Он завершил две картины стульев: «Стул Ван Гога» и «Стул Гогена».

После долгих просьб Ван Гога 23 октября Гоген прибыл в Арль, и в ноябре они нарисовали вместе. Гоген изобразил Ван Гога в его Художнике подсолнухов ; Ван Гог писал картины по памяти, следуя совету Гогена. Среди этих «образных» картин Воспоминания о саду в Эттене. Их первое совместное предприятие на открытом воздухе было на Alyscamps, когда они произвели подвески Les Alyscamps. Единственная картина, которую Гоген завершил во время своего визита, была Ван Гог, рисующий подсолнухи.

Ван Гог и Гоген посетили Монпелье в декабре 1888 года, где они увидели работы Курбе и Делакруа в Музее Фабра. Их отношения начали ухудшаться; Ван Гог восхищался Гогеном и хотел, чтобы с ним обращались как с равным, но Гоген был высокомерным и властным, что расстраивало Ван Гога. Они часто ссорились; Ван Гог все больше опасался, что Гоген его бросит, и ситуация, которую Ван Гог описал как «чрезмерную напряженность», быстро приближалась к критической точке.

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  Ночное кафе, 1888. Йельский университет Университетская художественная галерея, Нью-Хейвен, Коннектикут

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  Красный виноградник, ноябрь 1888 года. Музей Пушкина, Москва. Продано Анне Бох, 1890

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  Стул Ван Гога, 1888. Национальная галерея, Лондон

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  Кресло Поля Гогена, 1888. Музей Ван Гога, Амстердам

Больница в Арле (декабрь 1888 г.)

Репортаж местной газеты от 30 декабря 1888 г., в котором говорится о членовредительстве Ван Гога. Портрет Феликса Рея, январь 1889 г., Музей Пушкина ; записка, написанная доктором Рей для романиста Ирвинга Стоуна, с набросками повреждений уха Ван Гога

Точная последовательность событий, которые привели к уродству Ван Гога, неизвестна. Гоген заявил 15 лет спустя, что ночь последовала за несколькими случаями физически угрожающего поведения. Их отношения были сложными, и Тео, возможно, был должен деньги Гогену, который подозревал, что братья использовали его в финансовом отношении. Кажется вероятным, что Ван Гог понял, что Гоген собирается уйти. В следующие дни прошел проливной дождь, ведущей внезапно пришлось позаботиться о нескольких сотнях картин, писем и рисунков, а также о ее маленьком сыне Винсенте Виллеме Ван Гоге. Гоген не был склонен предлагать помощь в продвижении репутации Ван Гога, и брат Джоанны Андриес Бонгер также был равнодушен к его работе. Орье, один из первых сторонников Ван Гога среди критиков, умерли от брюшного тифа в 1892 году в возрасте двадцати семи лет.

Художник по дороге в Тараскон, август 1888 года (уничтожен пожаром во время Второй мировой войны)

В 1892 году Эмиль Бернар организовал небольшую персональную выставку картин Ван Гога в Париже, а Жюльен Танги выставил свои картины Ван Гога, несколько из которых были отправлены Йоханная Ван Гог-Бонгер. В апреле 1894 г. галерея Дюран-Рюэль в Париже согласилась принять 10 картин на консервацию из имения Ван Гога. В 1896 году художник-фовист Анри Матисс, тогда еще неизвестный студент-искусствовед, посетил Джона Рассела на Бель-Иль у берегов Бретани. Рассел был близким другом Ван Гога; он познакомил Матисса с творчеством голландца и подарил ему рисунок Ван Гога. Под округ Ван Гога Матисс отказался от своей землистой палитры в пользу ярких цветов.

В Париже в 1901 году в галерее Bernheim-Jeune прошла большая ретроспектива Ван Гога, которая взволновала Андре Дерен и Морис де Вламинк, и способствовали появлению фовизма. Важные групповые выставки художников Зондербунд проходили в Кельне в 1912 году, Оружейная выставка, Нью-Йорк в 1913 году и Берлине в 1914 году. Хенк Бреммер привлекательная роль. в обучении и рассказах о Ван Гоге, и познакомил Хелен Креллер-Мюллер с искусством Ван Гога; она стала заядлым коллекционером его работ. Ранние деятели немецкого экспрессионизма, такие как Эмиль Нольде, Ван признали свой долг перед работой Гога. Бреммер помогал Якобу Баарту де ла Файле, чей краткий каталог L’Oeuvre de Vincent Van Gogh появился в 1928 году.

Слава Ван Гога достигла своего первого пика в Австрии и Германии перед Первой мировой войной, что способствовало публикации его писем в трех томах в 1914 году. Его письма выразительны и грамотны, и были названы одними из выдающихся произведений 19 века в своем роде. Они положили начало захватывающей мифологии Ван Гога как интенсивного и преданного художника, который пострадал за свое искусство и умер молодым. В 1934 году романист Ирвинг Стоун написал биографический роман о жизни Ван Гога под названием Жажда жизни, основанный на письмах Ван Гога Тео. Этот роман и фильм 1956 года еще больше увеличили его известность, особенно в Штатах, где Стоун предположил, что только несколько сотен человек слышали о Ван Гоге его неожиданного бестселлера.

Посетители смотрят фургон. Гога Звездная ночь в Музее современного искусства (MOMA) Нью-Йорка

В 1957 году Фрэнсис Бэкон создал серию картин по репродукциям картины Ван Гога «Художник». на дороге в Тараскон, оригинал которой был разрушен во время Второй мировой войны. Бэкон был вдохновлен образом, который он описал как «преследующий», и считал Ван Гога отчужденным аутсайдером, что находило отклик у него. Бэкон отождествлял себя с теориями искусства Ван Гога и цитировал строки, написанные Тео: «[Реальные] художники не рисуют вещи такими, какие они есть… [T] они рисуют их такими, какими они сами себя чувствуют».

Работы Ван Гога входят в число самых дорогих картин в мире. Те, которые были проданы за 100 миллионов долларов США (эквивалент на сегодняшний день), включают «Портрет доктора Гаше», Портрет Жозефа Рулена и «Ирисы». Метрополитен-музей приобрел копию Пшеничное поле с кипарисами в 1993 году за 57 миллионов долларов США. В 2015 году L’Allée des Alyscamps был продан на аукционе Сотбис, Нью-Йорк, за 66,3 миллиона долларов США, что превышает его резерв в 40 миллионов долларов США.

Музей Ван Гога

Музей Ван Гога, Амстердам

Племянник и тезка Ван Гога, Винсент Виллем Ван Гог (1890–1978), унаследовал поместье после своей матери в 1925 году. В начале 1950-х годов он организовал публикацию полного издания писем, представленных в четырех томах и нескольких языках. Затем он начал переговоры с правительством Нидерландов о субсидировании фонда для покупки и размещения всей коллекции. Сын Тео участвовал в планировании проекта в надежде, что работы будут выставлены в наилучших условиях. Проект начался в 1963 году; Архитектор Геррит Ритвельд был уполномочен спроектировать его, и после его смерти в 1964 году Кишо Курокава взял на себя ответственность. Работа продолжалась на протяжении 1960-х годов, и в 1972 году было запланировано его торжественное открытие.

Музей Ван Гога открылся на Музейной площади в Амстердаме в 1973 году. второй по музею в Нидерландах Государственный музей, который регулярно принимает более 1,5 миллиона посетителей в год. В 2015 году их было рекордно 1,9 миллиона. Восемь пять процентов посетителей из других стран.

Ссылки

Сноски

Цитаты

Источники

Внешние ссылки

• Винсент Ван Гог: Автопортрет 1887 года — подробнее на NeoImpressionism.net
• Винсент Ван Гог в Британской энциклопедии

• Галерея Винсента Ван Гога, полное собрание сочинений и писем Ван Гога
• Винсент Ван Гог Буквы, полные письма Ван Гога (переведенные на английский и аннотированные)
• Винсент Ван Гог, учебный ресурс по Ван Гогу
• Работы Винсента Ван Гога в Project Gutenberg
• Работы Винсента Ван Гога или о нем в Internet Archive
• Работы Винсента Ван Гога в LibriVox (аудиокниги в общественном достоянии)

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