Vincent Van Gogh (1853-1890)

Vincent Willem van Gogh is considered one of the greatest painters in European art history. He produced some 900 paintings and 1100 drawings during a period of only ten years before he became mentally ill and committed suicide. He had little success during his lifetime, but his posthumous fame grew rapidly, especially following a showing of 71 of Van Gogh's paintings in Paris 11 years after his death.

Van Gogh's influence on expressionism, fauvism and early abstraction has been enormous, and can be seen in many other aspects of 20th-century art. Several paintings by Van Gogh rank among the most expensive paintings in the world, beaten only by Picasso.

Vincent Willem van Gogh was born in Zundert in the Province of Brabant, a province of the Netherlands, the son of Anna Cornelia Carbentus and Theodorus van Gogh, a Protestant minister. Van Gogh found his father's profession appealing and would be drawn to it later in his life. As a child Vincent was a serious, silent and thoughtful child. Four years after van Gogh was born, his brother Theodorus (Theo) was born. In 1869, at the age of 16, he worked as an art dealer in the Hague. In 1877 he studied theology at the University of Amsterdam for two years. During this period he started to produce charcoal sketches.

In 1880, Vincent followed the suggestion of his brother Theo and took up painting in earnest. For a brief period Vincent took painting lessons from Anton Mauve in The Hague whose influences would remain in Vincent's work, notably in the way he played with light and in the looseness of his brush strokes. However his use of color, favoring dark tones, set him apart from his teacher. From this time Theo would regularly send him money from Paris because Vincent was not earning any, which continued until the end of his life.

In 1881, he moved in with his parents at their house in Etten. Vincent painted his first watercolor painting in 1882. His uncle Cornelis commissioned him to make a series of 12 views of The Hague. Impressed and influenced by Jean-François Millet, Van Gogh focused on painting peasants and rural scenes. He moved to the Dutch province Drenthe, later to Nuenen, North Brabant, also in the Netherlands, to live with his parents again. Here he painted in 1885 The Potato Eaters. Vincent complained to Theo that Theo was not making enough effort to sell his paintings in Paris, Theo replied that they were too dark and not in line with the current style of bright Impressionist paintings.

In the winter of 1885-1886, Van Gogh attended the art academy of Antwerp. This proved a disappointment, as he was dismissed after a few months by Professor Eugène Siberdt. Van Gogh did, however, become familiar with Japanese art during this period, which he started to collect eagerly. He admired its bright colors, use of canvas space and the role lines played in the picture. These impressions would influence him strongly. Van Gogh made some paintings in Japanese style. Also some of the portraits he painted are set against a background which shows Japanese art.

In spring 1886, Van Gogh went to Paris, where he moved in with his brother Theo; they shared a house on Montmartre. Here he met the painters Edgar Degas, Camille Pissarro, Emile Bernard, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and Paul Gauguin. He discovered impressionism and liked its use of light and color, more than its lack of social engagement. He especially loved the technique known as pointillism (where many small dots are applied to the canvas that blend into rich colors, to one seeing it from a distance), which made its mark on Van Gogh's own style. Van Gogh also used complementary colors, especially blue and orange, in close proximity in order to enhance the brilliance of each. A lovely quote from one of his letters: "I want to use colors that complement each other, that cause each other to shine brilliantly, that complete each other like a man and a woman."

When city life and living with his brother proved too much, Van Gogh left Paris and went to Arles, Bouches-du-Rhône, France, arriving there on February 21, 1888. He was impressed with the local landscape and hoped to found an art colony. He decorated a "yellow house" and created a celebrated series of yellow sunflower paintings for this purpose. Only Paul Gauguin, whose simplified color schemes and forms (known as synthetism) attracted Van Gogh, followed his invitation. The admiration was mutual, and Gauguin painted Van Gogh painting sunflowers. However their encounter ended in a quarrel. On December 23, 1888, Van Gogh cut off the lower part of his own left ear.

One of Vincent's famous paintings, the Bedroom in Arles, uses bright yellow and unusual perspective effects in depicting the interior of his bedroom. The boldly vanishing lines are sometimes attributed to his changing mental condition. The only painting he sold during his lifetime, The Red Vineyard, was created in 1888. Now on display in the Pushkin Museum in Moscow, Russia, it sold for only 400 francs (about $68 today!).

Van Gogh now exchanged painting dots for small stripes. He suffered from depression, and in May 1889 on his own request Van Gogh was admitted to the psychiatric center at Monastery Saint-Paul de Mausole in Saint Remy de Provence, Bouches-du-Rhône, France. During his stay here the clinic and its garden became his main subject. At this time his work began to be dominated by swirls. This is especially shown in his most famous painting, The Starry Night.

In May 1890, Vincent left the clinic and went to the physician Paul Gachet, in Auvers-sur-Oise near Paris, where he was closer to his brother Theo, who had recently married. Gachet had been recommended to him by Pissarro; he had treated several artists before. Here Van Gogh created his only etching: a portrait of the melancholic doctor Gachet. His depression deepened, and on July 27, at the age of 37, he shot himself. Without realizing that he was fatally wounded, he returned to the Ravoux Inn, where he died two days later, with Theo at his side.