Vincent van Gogh
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This is a Dutch name; the family name is Van Gogh, not Gogh.
Vincent van Gogh
Self-Portrait, 1889
Born
30 March 1853
Zundert, Netherlands
Died
29 July 1890 (aged 37)
Auvers-sur-Oise, France
Nationality Dutch
Education
Anton Mauve
Known for
Painting, drawing
Notable
Starry Night, Sunflowers,Bedroom in
work
Arles, Portrait of Dr. Gachet, Sorrow
Movement
Post-Impressionism
Vincent Willem van Gogh (Dutch: [ˈvɪnsɛnt ˈʋɪləm vɑn ˈɣɔx] ( listen);[note 1] 30 March 1853 – 29 July
1890) was aDutch post-Impressionist painter whose work had far-reaching influence on 20th-century
art. His paintings includeportraits, self portraits, landscapes, still lifes of cypresses, wheat fields,
and sunflowers. Van Gogh was born to upper middle class parents and spent his early adulthood
working for a firm of art dealers before traveling to The Hague, London and Paris, after which he
taught in England at Isleworth and Ramsgate. He drew as a child but did not paint until his late
twenties; most of his best-known works were completed during the last two years of his life. In just
over a decade, he produced more than 2,100 artworks, including 860 oil paintings and more than
1,300 watercolors, drawings, sketches and prints.
He was deeply religious as a younger man and aspired to be a pastor. From 1879 he worked as a
missionary in a mining region in Belgium where he sketched people from the local community, and in
1885 painted his first major workThe Potato Eaters. His palette then consisted mainly of somber
earth tones and showed no sign of the vivid coloration that distinguished his later paintings. In March
1886, he moved to Paris and discovered the French Impressionists. Later, he moved to the south of
France and was influenced by the region's strong sunlight. His paintings grew brighter in color, and
he developed the unique and highly recognizable style that became fully realized during his stay
in Arles in 1888.
After years of anxiety and frequent bouts of mental illness he died aged 37 from a self-inflicted
gunshot wound. The extent to which his mental health affected his painting has been widely
debated. Despite a widespread tendency to romanticize his ill health, art historians see an artist
deeply frustrated by the inactivity and incoherence wrought through illness. His late paintings show
an artist at the height of his abilities, completely in control, and according to art criticRobert Hughes,
"longing for concision and grace".[1]
Contents
[hide]



1Letters
2Biography
o 2.1Early life
o 2.2Etten, Drenthe and The Hague
o 2.3Emerging artist
 2.3.1Nuenen and Antwerp (1883–1886)
 2.3.2Paris (1886–1888)
o 2.4Artistic breakthrough and final years
 2.4.1Move to Arles (1888–1889)
 2.4.2Gauguin's visit
 2.4.3Saint-Rémy (May 1889 – May 1890)
 2.4.4Auvers-sur-Oise (May–July 1890)
o 2.5Death
3Work
o 3.1Self portraits
o 3.2Portraits
o 3.3Cypresses
o 3.4Flowering Orchards
o
o





3.5Flowers
3.6Wheat fields
4Legacy
o 4.1Posthumous fame
o 4.2Influence
5Footnotes
6References
7Bibliography
8External links
Letters
See also: The Letters of Vincent van Gogh
Vincentc. 1871–1872 aged 18. This photograph was taken at the time when he was working at the
branch of Goupil & Cie's gallery in The Hague.[2][3]
Theo in 1888 at 31. Theo was a life-long supporter and friend to his brother. The two are buried
together at Auvers-sur-Oise.
The most comprehensive primary source for understanding Van Gogh is the collection of letters
between him and his younger brother, art dealer Theo van Gogh.[4] They lay the foundation for most
of what is known about his thoughts and beliefs.[5][6] Theo provided his brother with financial and
emotional support. Their lifelong friendship, and most of what is known of Vincent's thoughts and
theories of art, is recorded in the hundreds of letters exchanged between 1872 and 1890. There are
more than 600 from Vincent to Theo, and 40 from Theo to Vincent.
Although many are undated, art historians have generally been able to put them in chronological
order. Problems remain, mainly in dating those from Arles, although it is known that during that
period Van Gogh wrote around 200 letters to friends in Dutch, French and English.[7] The period
when Vincent lived in Paris is the most difficult to analyze because the brothers lived together and
had no need to correspond.[8] Along with the letters to and from Theo, there are other surviving
documents including to Van Rappard, Émile Bernard, Van Gogh's sister Wil and her friend Line
Kruysse.[9] The letters were annotated in 1913 by Theo's widow, Johanna van Gogh-Bonger, who
later said that she published with "trepidation" because she did not want the details of the artist's life
to overshadow his work.[4]
Biography
Main article: Vincent van Gogh chronology
Early life
See also: Van Gogh's family in his art
Vincent c. 1866, approx. age 13
Vincent Willem van Gogh was born on 30 March 1853 in Groot-Zundert, a village close to Breda, in
the predominantly Catholic province of North Brabant in the southern Netherlands.[10][11] He was the
oldest surviving child of Theodorus van Gogh, a minister of the Dutch Reformed Church, and Anna
Cornelia Carbentus. Vincent was given the name of his grandfather, and of a brother stillborn exactly
a year before his birth.[note 2] The practice of reusing a name was not unusual. Vincent was a common
name in the Van Gogh family: his grandfather, Vincent (1789–1874), received his degree of theology
at the University of Leiden in 1811. Grandfather Vincent had six sons, three of whom became art
dealers. Grandfather Vincent had perhaps been named in turn after his own father's uncle, the
successful sculptor Vincent van Gogh (1729–1802).[12][13] Art and religion were the two occupations to
which the Van Gogh family gravitated. His brother Theodorus "Theo" was born on 1 May 1857. He
had another brother, Cor, and three sisters: Elisabeth, Anna, and Willemina "Wil".[14]
Vincent was a serious and thoughtful child. He attended the village school at Zundert from 1860,
where a single Catholic teacher taught around 200 pupils. From 1861, he and his sister Anna were
taught at home by a governess, until 1 October 1864, when he was placed in Jan Provily's boarding
school at Zevenbergen about 20 miles (32 km) away. He was distressed to leave his family home.
On 15 September 1866, he went to the new middle school, Willem II College in Tilburg. Constantijn
C. Huysmans, a successful artist in Paris, taught Van Gogh to draw at the school and advocated a
systematic approach to the subject. Vincent's interest in art began at an early age. He began to draw
as a child and continued making drawings throughout the years leading to his decision to become an
artist. Though well-done and expressive,[15] his early drawings do not approach the intensity he
developed in his later work.[16] In March 1868, Van Gogh abruptly left school and returned home. A
later comment on his early years was in an 1883 letter to Theo in which he wrote, "My youth was
gloomy and cold and sterile."[17]
Van Gogh's drawing of 87 Hackford Road
In July 1869, his uncle Cent helped him obtain a position with the art dealer Goupil & Cie in The
Hague. After his training, in June 1873, Goupil transferred him to London, where he lodged at 87
Hackford Road, Brixton, and worked at Messrs. Goupil & Co., 17 Southampton Street.[18] This was a
happy time for Vincent; he was successful at work and was, at 20, earning more than his father.
Theo's wife later remarked that this was the happiest year of his life. He fell in love with his
landlady's daughter, Eugénie Loyer, but when he finally confessed his feelings to her, she rejected
him, saying that she was secretly engaged to a former lodger. He became increasingly isolated and
fervent about religion; his father and uncle arranged for him to be transferred to Paris, where he
became resentful at how art was treated as a commodity, a fact apparent to customers. On 1 April
1876, Goupil terminated his employment.[19]
The house "Holme Court" in Isleworth, where Van Gogh stayed in 1876 [20] [21]
Van Gogh returned to England for unpaid work as a supply teacher in a small boarding
school in Ramsgate. When the proprietor of the school relocated to Isleworth, Middlesex, Van Gogh
moved with him, taking the train to Richmond and the remainder of the journey on foot.[22] The
arrangement did not work out and he left to become a Methodist minister's assistant, following his
wish to "preach the gospel everywhere".[23] At Christmas, he returned home and found work in a
bookshop inDordrecht for six months. He was unhappy in the position, and spent much of his time
either doodling or translating passages from the Bible into English, French and German.[24] According
to his roommate of the time, a young teacher named Görlitz, Van Gogh ate frugally, and preferred
not to eat meat.[25][note 3]
Van Gogh's religious zeal grew until he felt he had found his true vocation. To support his effort to
become a pastor, his family sent him to Amsterdam to study theology in May 1877, where he stayed
with his uncle Jan van Gogh, a naval Vice Admiral.[26][27] Vincent prepared for the entrance exam with
his uncle Johannes Stricker, a respected theologian who published the first "Life of Jesus" in the
Netherlands. Van Gogh failed the exam, and left his uncle Jan's house in July 1878. He then
undertook, but failed, a three-month course at the Vlaamsche Opleidingsschool,
a Protestant missionary school in Laeken, near Brussels.[28]
The house where Van Gogh stayed in Cuesmes in 1880; while living here he decided to become an
artist
In January 1879, he took a temporary post as a missionary in the village of Petit Wasmes[note 4] in the
coal-mining district of Borinage in Belgium at Charbonnage de Marcasse, Van Gogh lived like those
he preached to, sleeping on straw in a small hut at the back of the baker's house where he was
staying. The baker's wife reported hearing Van Gogh sobbing at night in the hut. His choice of
squalid living conditions did not endear him to the appalled church authorities, who dismissed him for
"undermining the dignity of the priesthood". He then walked to Brussels,[29] returned briefly to the
village of Cuesmes in the Borinage, but gave in to pressure from his parents to return home to Etten.
He stayed there until around March the following year,[note 5] a cause of increasing concern and
frustration for his parents. There was particular conflict between Vincent and his father, who made
inquiries about having Vincent committed to the lunatic asylum at Geel.[30][note 6]
He returned to Cuesmes, where he lodged until October with a miner named Charles Decrucq.[31] He
became interested in the people and scenes around him, and recorded his time there in his
drawings, following Theo's suggestion that he take up art in earnest. He traveled to Brussels that
autumn, intending to follow Theo's recommendation to study with the prominent Dutch artist Willem
Roelofs, who persuaded him—in spite of his aversion to formal schools of art—to attend
the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels, where he registered on 15 November 1880. At the
Académie, he studied anatomy and the standard rules of modeling and perspective, about which he
said, "you have to know just to be able to draw the least thing."[32] Van Gogh aspired to become an
artist in God's service, stating: "to try to understand the real significance of what the great artists, the
serious masters, tell us in their masterpieces, that leads to God; one man wrote or told it in a book;
another in a picture."[33]
Etten, Drenthe and The Hague
See also: Early works of Vincent van Gogh
Kee Vos Stricker with her son Jan c. 1879/1880.
Van Gogh moved with his parents to the Etten countryside in April 1881. He continued drawing,
often using neighbors as subjects. During the first summer, he took long walks with his recently
widowed cousin, Kee Vos-Stricker, daughter of his mother's older sister and Johannes
Stricker.[34] Kee was seven years older than Van Gogh and had an eight-year-old son. He proposed
marriage, but she refused with the words "No, nay, never" ("nooit, neen, nimmer").[35][36] Late that
November, Van Gogh wrote a strongly worded letter to Johannes,[37] and then hurried to Amsterdam,
where he spoke with him on several occasions.[38] Kee refused to see him, and her parents wrote:
"Your persistence is disgusting." In desperation, 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."[39] He did not recall the event
well, but later assumed that his uncle blew out the flame. Kee's father made it clear to him that Kee's
refusal should be heeded and that the two would not be married[40] because of Van Gogh's inability to
support himself.[41] Van Gogh's perception of his uncle and former tutor's hypocrisy affected him
deeply and put an end to his religious faith forever.[42] That Christmas, he refused to attend church,
quarreling violently with his father as a result and leading him to leave home the same day for The
Hague.[43][44]
He settled in The Hague in January 1882, where he visited his cousin-in-law, Anton Mauve, a
Dutch realist painter and a leading member of the Hague School. Mauve introduced him to painting
in both oil and watercolor and lent him money to set up a studio,[45] but the two soon fell out, possibly
over the issue of drawing from plaster casts.[46] Van Gogh's uncle Cornelis, an art dealer,
commissioned 12 ink drawings of views of the city, which Van Gogh completed soon after arriving in
The Hague, along with a further seven drawings that May.[47] In June, he spent three weeks in a
hospital, suffering from gonorrhea,[48] and that summer, he began to paint in oil.[49]
Rooftops, View from the Atelier The Hague, 1882, watercolour, Private collection.
Mauve appears to have suddenly gone cold towards Van Gogh and did not return some of his
letters.[50] Van Gogh supposed that Mauve had learned of his new domestic arrangement with an
alcoholic prostitute, Clasina Maria "Sien" Hoornik(1850–1904), and her young daughter.[51][52] He had
met Sien towards the end of January, when she had a five-year-old daughter and was pregnant. She
had already borne two children who died, although Van Gogh was unaware of this;[53] and on 2 July,
she gave birth to a baby boy, Willem.[54] When Van Gogh's father discovered the details of their
relationship, he put pressure on his son to abandon Sien and her children, although Vincent at first
defied him.[55] Vincent considered moving the family out of the city, but in the autumn of 1883 left
Sien and the two children.[56] It is possible that lack of money pushed Sien back to prostitution; the
home became less happy, and Van Gogh may have felt family life was irreconcilable with his artistic
development. When he left, Sien gave her daughter to her mother and baby Willem to her brother.
She then moved toDelft, and later to Antwerp.[57]
Willem remembered being taken to visit his mother in Rotterdam at around the age of 12, where his
uncle tried to persuade Sien to marry in order to legitimize the child. Willem recalled his mother
saying, "But I know who the father is. He was an artist I lived with nearly 20 years ago in The Hague.
His name was Van Gogh." She then turned to Willem and said "You are called after him."[58] While he
believed himself Van Gogh's son, the timing of his birth makes this unlikely.[59] In 1904, Sien drowned
herself in the River Scheldt.[60] Van Gogh moved to the Dutch province of Drenthe, in the northern
Netherlands. That December, driven by loneliness, he went to stay with his parents, who had been
posted to Nuenen, North Brabant.[60]
Emerging artist
See also: Still life paintings by Vincent van Gogh (Netherlands)
Nuenen and Antwerp (1883–1886)
The Potato Eaters, 1885, Van Gogh Museum
In Nuenen, Van Gogh devoted himself to drawing, and he gave money to boys to bring him birds'
nests for subject matter for paintings,[note 7] and he made many sketches and paintings of weavers in
their cottages.[61] In autumn 1884, Margot Begemann, a neighbor's daughter and ten years his
senior, often joined him on his painting forays. She fell in love, and he reciprocated – though less
enthusiastically. They decided to marry, but the idea was opposed by both families. As a result,
Margot took an overdose of strychnine. She was saved when Van Gogh rushed her to a nearby
hospital.[54] On 26 March 1885, his father died of a heart attack and he grieved deeply at the loss.[62]
Skull of a Skeleton with Burning Cigarette, 1885–1886, oil on canvas, Van Gogh Museum
For the first time there was interest from Paris in his work. That spring he completed what is
generally considered his first major work, The Potato Eaters, the culmination of several years work
painting peasant character studies.[63] In August 1885, his work was first exhibited in the windows of
the paint dealer Leurs in The Hague. After one of his young peasant sittersbecame pregnant that
September, Van Gogh was accused of forcing himself upon her[note 8] and the Catholic village priest
forbade parishioners from modeling for him.[64]
He painted several groups of still-life paintings in 1885; Still-Life with Straw Hat and Pipe and Still-life
with Earthen Pot and Clogs are characterized by smooth, meticulous brushwork and fine shading of
colors.[65] During his two-year stay in Nuenen, he completed numerous drawings and watercolors
and nearly 200 oil paintings. His palette consisted mainly of somber earth tones, particularly dark
brown, and he showed no sign of developing the vivid coloration that distinguishes his later, bestknown work. When he complained that Theo was not making enough effort to sell his paintings in
Paris, his brother wrote back, telling him that the paintings were too dark and not in line with the
current style of bright Impressionist paintings.[66]
He moved in November 1885 to Antwerp and rented a small room above a paint dealer's shop in the
Rue des Images (Lange Beeldekensstraat).[67] He had little money and ate poorly, preferring to
spend the money Theo sent on painting materials and models. Bread, coffee, and tobacco were his
staple intake. In February 1886, he wrote to Theo saying that he could only remember eating six hot
meals since May of the previous year. His teeth became loose and painful.[68] While in Antwerp, he
applied himself to the study of color theory and spent time in museums, particularly studying the
work of Peter Paul Rubens, gaining encouragement to broaden his palette to carmine, cobalt,
and emerald green. He bought Japanese Ukiyo-e woodcuts in the docklands, and incorporated their
style into the background of some of his paintings.[69] While in Antwerp, Van Gogh began to
drink absinthe heavily.[70] He was treated by Dr. Amadeus Cavenaile, whose practice was near the
docklands,[note 9] possibly for syphilis;[note 10] the treatment of alum irrigation and sitz baths was jotted
down by Van Gogh in one of his notebooks.[71] Despite his rejection of 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. For most of February, he was ill and run down by overwork, a
poor diet, and excessive smoking.[72]
Paris (1886–1888)
See also: Japonaiserie (Van Gogh) and Still life paintings by Vincent van Gogh (Paris)
Courtesan (afterEisen), 1887,Van Gogh Museum
The Blooming Plumtree (afterHiroshige), 1887, Van Gogh Museum
Portrait of Père Tanguy (1887),Musée Rodin
Van Gogh traveled to Paris in March 1886, where he shared Theo's Rue Laval apartment
onMontmartre, to study at Fernand Cormon's studio. In June, they took a larger apartment further
uphill, at 54 Rue Lepic. Because they had no need to write letters to communicate, little is known
about this stay in Paris.[73] In Paris, he painted portraits of friends and acquaintances, still-life
paintings, views ofLe Moulin de la Galette, scenes in Montmartre, Asnières, and along the Seine.
During his stay in Paris, he collected more Japanese ukiyo-e woodblock prints; he became
interested in such works when, in 1885, in Antwerp he used them to decorate the walls of his studio.
He collected hundreds of prints, which are visible in the backgrounds of several of his paintings. In
his 1887 Portrait of Père Tanguy, several can be seen hanging on the wall behind the main figure.
In The Courtesan or Oiran (after Kesai Eisen) (1887), Van Gogh traced the figure from a
reproduction on the cover of the magazineParis Illustre, which he then graphically enlarged in the
painting.[74] His 1888 Plum Tree in Blossom (After Hiroshige) is a vivid example of the admiration he
had for the prints he collected. His version is slightly bolder than Hiroshige's original.[75]
After seeing Adolphe Joseph Thomas Monticelli's work at the Galerie Delareybarette, which he
admired, Van Gogh adopted a brighter palette and a bolder attack, particularly in paintings such as
his Seascape at Saintes-Maries (1888).[76][77] Two years later, in 1890, Vincent and Theo paid to have
a book about Monticelli published, and Van Gogh bought some of Monticelli's paintings, adding them
to his collection.[78]
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec,Portrait of Vincent van Gogh, 1887, pastel drawing, Van Gogh Museum.
For months, Van Gogh worked at Cormon's studio, where he frequented the circle of the BritishAustralian artist John Peter Russell,[79] and met fellow students like Émile Bernard, Louis Anquetin,
and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec – who painted a portrait of Van Gogh with pastel. The group
congregated at Julien "Père" Tanguy's paint store (which was, at that time, the only place wherePaul
Cézanne's paintings were displayed). He had easy access to Impressionist works in Paris at the
time. In 1886, two large vanguard exhibitions were staged; shows where Neo-Impressionism was
first exhibited and seen, with works by Georges Seurat andPaul Signac becoming the talk of the
town. Though Theo kept a stock of Impressionist paintings in his gallery on Boulevard Montmartre
(by artists including Claude Monet, Alfred Sisley, Edgar Degas, and Camille Pissarro), Van Gogh
seemingly had problems acknowledging developments in how artists view and paint their subject
matter.[80]
Conflicts arose between the brothers. At the end of 1886, Theo found that living with Vincent was
"almost unbearable". By the spring of 1887, they were again at peace, although Van Gogh moved
to Asnières, a northwestern suburb of Paris, where he became acquainted with Signac. With Émile
Bernard, he adopted elements of Pointillism, a technique in which a multitude of small colored dots
are applied to the canvas such that—when seen from a distance—they create an optical blend of
hues.[81] The style stresses the value of complementary colors—including blue and orange—to form
vibrant contrasts that are enhanced when juxtaposed.[82]
While in Asnières, he painted parks and restaurants and the Seine, including Bridges across the
Seine at Asnieres. In November 1887, Theo and Vincent befriended Paul Gauguin who had just
arrived in Paris.[83] Towards the end of the year, Vincent arranged an exhibition of paintings by
himself, Bernard, Anquetin, and probably Toulouse-Lautrec in the Grand-Bouillon Restaurant du
Chalet, 43 Avenue de Clichy, Montmartre. In a contemporary account, Émile Bernard wrote of the
event: "On the avenue de Clichy a new restaurant was opened. Vincent used to eat there. He
proposed to the manager that an exhibition be held there .... Canvases by Anquetin, by Lautrec, by
Koning ...filled the hall....It really had the impact of something new; it was more modern than
anything that was made in Paris at that moment."[84] There Bernard and Anquetin sold their first
paintings, and Van Gogh exchanged work with Gauguin, who soon departed to Pont-Aven.
Discussions on art, artists, and their social situations that started during this exhibition continued and
expanded to include visitors to the show, like Pissarro and his son Lucien, Signac, and Seurat.
Finally, in February 1888, feeling worn out from life in Paris, Vincent left, having painted over 200
paintings during his two years in the city. Only hours before his departure, accompanied by Theo, he
paid his first and only visit to Seurat in his atelier (studio).[85]
Artistic breakthrough and final years
Move to Arles (1888–1889)
See also: Langlois Bridge at Arles (Van Gogh series)
The Yellow House, 1888, Van Gogh Museum
Bedroom in Arles, 1888, Van Gogh Museum
Van Gogh moved to Arles, hoping for refuge at a time when he was ill from drink and suffering from
smoker's cough.[7] He arrived on 21 February 1888 and took a room at the Hôtel-Restaurant Carrel,
which he had idealistically expected to look like one of Hokusai (1760–1849) or Utamaro's (1753–
1806) prints.[7] He seems to have moved to the town with thoughts of founding a utopian art colony.
The Danish artist Christian Mourier-Petersen (1858–1945) became his companion for two months,
and at first Arles appeared exotic and filthy. In a letter, he described it as a foreign country: "The
Zouaves, the brothels, the adorable little Arlesiennes going to their 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."[86] Van Gogh was enchanted by the local landscape and light and his
works from this period are richly draped in yellow, ultramarine, and mauve. His portrayals of the
Arles landscape are informed by his Dutch upbringing; the patchwork of fields and avenues appear
flat and lack perspective, but excel in their intensity of color.[7][86] The vibrant light in Arles excited him,
and his newfound appreciation is seen in the range and scope of his work. That March, he painted
local landscapes using a gridded "perspective frame". Three of these paintings 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.[2][87] On 1 May, he signed a lease for
15 francs per month in the eastern wing of the Yellow House at No. 2 Place Lamartine. The rooms
were unfurnished and uninhabited for some time. He was still at the Hôtel Restaurant Carrel, but the
rate charged by the hotel was 5 francs a week, which he found excessive. He disputed the price,
took the case to a local arbitrator, and was awarded a twelve franc reduction on the total bill.[88]
The Night Café, 1888, Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven
Paul Gauguin's Armchair, 1888, Van Gogh Museum
He moved from the Hôtel Carrel to the Café de la Gare on 7 May,[89] where he befriended the
proprietors, Joseph andMarie Ginoux. Although the Yellow House had to be furnished before he
could fully move in, Van Gogh was able to utilize it as a studio.[90] Hoping to have a gallery to display
his work, his project at this time was a series of paintings including Van Gogh's
Chair (1888), Bedroom in Arles (1888), The Night Café (1888), Cafe Terrace at Night(September
1888), Starry Night Over the Rhone (1888), and Still Life: Vase with Twelve Sunflowers (1888), all
intended to form the décoration for the Yellow House.[91] Van Gogh wrote about The Night Café: "I
have tried to express the idea that the café is a place where one can ruin oneself, go mad, or commit
a crime."[92]
When he visited Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer that June, he gave lessons to a Zouave second
lieutenant—Paul-Eugène Milliet[93] —and painted boats on the sea and the village.[94] MacKnight
introduced Van Gogh to Eugène Boch, a Belgian painter who stayed at times in Fontvieille, and the
two exchanged visits in July.[93]
Gauguin's visit
See also: Hospital in Arles (Van Gogh series)
Still Life: Vase with Twelve Sunflowers, August 1888, Neue Pinakothek, Munich
The Café Terrace on the Place du Forum, Arles, at Night, September 1888, Kröller-Müller
Museum,Otterlo, The Netherlands
Joseph Roulin (The Postman), 1888,Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Van Gogh's Chair, 1888, National Gallery, London
Local newspaper report dated 30 December 1888 recording Vincent's self-mutilation.[95] "Last Sunday
night at half past eleven a painter named Vincent Vangogh, appeared at themaison de tolérance No
1, asked for a girl called Rachel, and handed her ... his ear with these words: 'Keep this object like a
treasure.' Then he disappeared. The police, informed of these events, which could only be the work
of an unfortunate madman, looked the next morning for this individual, whom they found in bed with
scarcely a sign of life.
The poor man was taken to hospital without delay."[96]
When Gauguin agreed to visit Arles, Van Gogh hoped for friendship, and the realization of his
utopian idea of an artists collective. That August he painted sunflowers. When Boch visited again,
Van Gogh painted a portrait of him, as well as the study The Poet Against a Starry Sky. Boch's
sister Anna (1848–1936), also an artist, purchased The Red Vineyard in 1890.[97][98] In preparation for
Gauguin's visit, Van Gogh bought two beds, on advice from his friend the station's postal
supervisor Joseph Roulin, whose portrait he painted, and on 17 September spent the first night in
the still sparsely furnished Yellow House.[99][100] When Gauguin consented to work and live side-byside in Arles with Van Gogh, he started to work on The Décoration for the Yellow House, probably
the most ambitious effort he ever undertook.[101]Van Gogh did two chair paintings: Van Gogh's
Chair and Gauguin's Chair.[102]
Paul Gauguin, The Painter of Sunflowers: Portrait of Vincent van Gogh, 1888, Van Gogh Museum,
Amsterdam.
After repeated requests, Gauguin finally arrived in Arles on 23 October. During November, the two
painted together. Gauguin painted Van Gogh's portrait The Painter of Sunflowers: Portrait of Vincent
van Gogh, and—uncharacteristically—Van Gogh painted some pictures from memory (deferring to
Gauguin's ideas in this) as well as his The Red Vineyard. Notable amongst these "imaginative"
paintings isMemory of the Garden at Etten.[103][104] Their first joint outdoor venture was at
theAlyscamps, when they produced Les Alyscamps.[105]
They visited Montpellier that December, where they saw works by Courbet and Delacroix in
the Musée Fabre.[106] However, their relationship began to deteriorate. Van Gogh admired Gauguin
and desperately wanted to be treated as his equal, but Gauguin was arrogant and domineering,
something that often frustrated Van Gogh. They quarreled about art; 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 a crisis point.[107]
The precise chain of events that led to Van Gogh slicing off his ear is not reliably known in any
detail. The only account attesting a supposed earlier razor attack on Gauguin comes from Gauguin
himself some fifteen years later, and biographers agree this account must be considered unreliable
and self-serving.[108][109][110] However, it does seem likely that, by 23 December 1888, Van Gogh had
realized that Gauguin was proposing to leave and that there had been some kind of contretemps
between the two.[111] That evening, Van Gogh severed his left ear (either wholly or in part; accounts
differ) with a razor, inducing a severe haemorrhage.[note 11] He bandaged his wound, wrapped the ear
in paper, and delivered the package to a brothel frequented by both him and Gauguin, before
returning home and collapsing. He was found unconscious the next day by the police[note 12] and taken
to the hospital.[112][113][114] The local newspaper reported that Van Gogh had given the ear to a
prostitute with an instruction to guard it carefully.[115]
In Gauguin's later account, he implies that—in fact—Van Gogh had left the ear with the doorman as
a memento for Gauguin.[108] Van Gogh himself had no recollection of these events, and it is plain that
he had suffered an acute psychotic episode.[116] Family letters of the time make it clear that the event
had not been unexpected.[117] He had suffered a nervous collapse in Antwerp some three years
before, and as early as 1880 his father had proposed committing him to an asylum
(at Gheel).[118] The hospital diagnosis was "generalized delirium", and within a few days Van Gogh
was sectioned.[117]
Vincent van Gogh's room in Saint Paul de Maussole
Limited access to the world outside the clinic resulted in a shortage of subject matter. He was left to
work on interpretations of other artist's paintings, such as Millet's The Sower and Noon – Rest from
Work (after Millet), as well as variations on his own earlier work. Van Gogh was an admirer of
the Realism of Jules Breton, Gustave Courbet, and Millet,[119] and he compared his copies to a
musician's interpreting Beethoven.[120][121] His The Round of the Prisoners (1890) was painted after
an engraving by Gustave Doré(1832–1883). It is suggested that the face of the prisoner in the center
of the painting and looking toward the viewer is Van Gogh himself, although the noted Van Gogh
scholar Jan Hulsker discounts this.[122][123] During the initial few days of his treatment, Van Gogh
repeatedly asked for Gauguin, but Gauguin stayed away. Gauguin told one of the policeman
attending the case, "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."[124] Gauguin wrote of
Van Gogh, "His state is worse, he wants to sleep with the patients, chase the nurses, and washes
himself in the coal bucket. That is to say, he continues the biblical mortifications."[117][124] Theo was
notified by Gauguin, and visited Van Gogh, as did both Madame Ginoux and Roulin. Gauguin left
Arles, and never saw Van Gogh again.[note 13]
Despite the pessimistic initial diagnosis, Van Gogh made a quick recovery. He returned to the Yellow
House by the beginning of January, but was to spend the following month between the hospital and
home, suffering from hallucinations and delusions that he was being poisoned. In March, the police
closed his house after a petition by 30 townspeople (including the Ginoux family), who called him
"fou roux" (the redheaded madman).[117] Paul Signac visited him in the hospital, and Van Gogh was
allowed home in his company. In April, he moved into rooms owned by his hospital physician Dr.
Rey after floods damaged paintings in his own home.[125][126] 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." Two months later, he left Arles and entered
an asylum (at his own request) in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence.[127]
Saint-Rémy (May 1889 – May 1890)
Main article: Saint-Paul Asylum, Saint-Rémy (Van Gogh series)
The Starry Night, June 1889, The Museum of Modern Art, New York
The Sower, 1888, Kröller-Müller Museum
On 8 May 1889, accompanied by his caregiver, the Reverend Salles, Van Gogh entered the hospital
at Saint Paul-de-Mausole. A former monastery in Saint-Rémy less than 20 miles (32 km) from Arles,
the hospital is located in an area of cornfields, vineyards, and olive trees and was at the time run by
a former naval doctor, Dr. Théophile Peyron. He had two small rooms: adjoining cells with barred
windows. The second was to be used as a studio.[128]
During his stay, the clinic and its garden became the main subjects of his paintings. He made
several studies of the hospital interiors, such as Vestibule of the Asylum and Saint-Remy
(September 1889). Some of the work from this time is characterized by swirls, including The Starry
Night, his best-known painting. He was allowed short supervised walks, which led to paintings
of cypresses and olive trees, such as Olive Trees with the Alpilles in the Background
1889, Cypresses 1889, Cornfield with Cypresses (1889),Country road in Provence by Night (1890).
That September, he also produced a further two versions of Bedroom in Arles.
Between February and April 1890 Van Gogh suffered a severe relapse. Nevertheless, he was able
to paint and draw a little during this time, and he later wrote Theo that he had made a few small
canvases "from memory ... reminisces of the North."[129] Amongst 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—save for this short period—Van Gogh's illness
had hardly any effect on his work, but in these he sees a reflection of Van Gogh's mental health at
the time.[130] Also belonging to this period is Sorrowing Old Man ("At Eternity's Gate"), a color study
that Hulsker describes as "another unmistakable remembrance of times long past."[130][131]
Two Peasant Women Digging in a Snow-Covered Field at Sunset, 1890, Foundation E.G. Bührle
Collection, Zurich, Switzerland
In February 1890, he painted five versions of L'Arlésienne (Madame Ginoux), based on
a charcoal sketchGauguin had produced when Madame Ginoux sat for both artists at the beginning
of November 1888.[132] The version intended for Madame Ginoux is lost. It was attempting to deliver
this painting to Madame Ginoux in Arles that precipitated his February relapse.[133] His work was
praised by Albert Aurier in the Mercure de France in January 1890, when he was described as "a
genius".[134] That February, he was invited by Les XX, a society ofavant-garde painters in Brussels, to
participate in their annual exhibition. At the opening dinner, Les XX member Henry de Groux insulted
Van Gogh's work. Toulouse-Lautrec demanded satisfaction, while Signac declared he would
continue to fight for Van Gogh's honor if Lautrec should surrender. Later, while Van Gogh's exhibit
was on display with the Artistes Indépendants in Paris, Monet said that his work was the best in the
show.[135] In February 1890, following the birth of his nephew Vincent Willem, he wrote in a letter to
his mother that, with the new addition to the family, he "started right away to make a picture for him,
to hang in their bedroom, branches ofwhite almond blossom against a blue sky."[136]
Auvers-sur-Oise (May–July 1890)
See also: Double-squares and Squares
The Church at Auvers, 1890,Musée d'Orsay, Paris
Portrait of Dr. Gachet, 1890, was sold for US$82.5 million in 1990.[137] Private collection
In May 1890, Van Gogh left the clinic in Saint-Rémy to move nearer the physician Dr. Paul
Gachet in Auvers-sur-Oise, and also to Theo. Gachet was recommended by Camille Pissarro who
had treated several other artists and was himself an amateur artist. Van Gogh's first impression was
that Gachet was "...sicker than I am, I think, or shall we say just as much."[138] In June 1890, he
painted several portraits of the physician, including Portrait of Dr. Gachet, and his only etching; in
each, the emphasis is on Gachet's melancholic disposition. Van Gogh stayed at the Auberge
Ravoux, where he paid 3francs and 50 centimes to rent an attic room measuring 75 square feet
(7.0 m2).
During his last weeks at Saint-Rémy, Van Gogh's thoughts returned to his "memories of the
North",[139] and several of the approximately 70 oils painted during his 70 days in Auvers-sur-Oise,
such as The Church at Auvers, are reminiscent of northern scenes.[140]
Wheat Field with Crows (July 1890) is an example of the use of double square canvases he
developed in the last weeks of his life in which he paired two square blank canvases to form a
single, larger canvas. In its turbulent intensity, it is among his most haunting and elemental
works.[141] It is often mistakenly believed to be his last work, but Hulsker lists seven paintings that
postdate it.[142]
Death
Self-Portrait, September 1889
Oil on canvas, 65 × 54 cm
Musée d'Orsay, Paris. This may have been Van Gogh's last self-portrait.[143](F627)
On 22 February 1890, Van Gogh suffered a new crisis that was "the starting point for one of the
saddest episodes in a life already rife with sad events," according to Hulsker. From February until
the end of April he was unable to bring himself to write, though he did continue to draw and
paint,[133] which follows a pattern begun the previous May, in 1889. For a year he "had fits of despair
and hallucination during which he could not work, and in between them, long clear months in which
he could and did, punctuated by extreme visionary ecstasy."[144]
On 27 July 1890, aged 37, Van Gogh shot himself in the chest with a revolver (although no gun was
ever found).[145] There were no witnesses and the location where he shot himself is unclear. Ingo
Walther writes, "Some think Van Gogh shot himself in the wheat field that had engaged his attention
as an artist of late; others think he did it at a barn near the inn."[146]Biographer David
Sweetman writes that the bullet was deflected by a rib bone 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 by two physicians. However, without a
surgeon present the bullet could not be removed. After tending to him as best they could, the two
physicians left him alone in his room, smoking his pipe. The following morning (Monday), Theo
rushed to be with his brother as soon as he was notified, and found him in surprisingly good shape,
but within hours Vincent began to fail due to an untreated infection caused by the wound. Van Gogh
died in the evening, 29 hours after he supposedly shot himself. According to Theo, his brother's last
words were: "The sadness will last forever."[145][147]
Vincent and Theo buried together in Auvers-sur-Oise. Vincent's stone bears the inscription: Ici
Repose Vincent van Gogh (1853–1890), Theo's Ici Repose Theodore van Gogh (1857–1891)
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 Dr. Gachet amongst some 20 family, friends and locals. The funeral was described by
Émile Bernard in a letter to Albert Aurier.[148][149] Theo suffered from syphilis and his health declined
rapidly after Vincent's death. Weak and unable to come to terms with Vincent's absence, he died six
months later, on 25 January, at Den Dolder, and he was buried in Utrecht.[150][151] In 1914, the year
she had Van Gogh's letters published, Jo Bonger had Theo's body exhumed, moved from Utrecht
and re-buried with Vincent at Auvers-sur-Oise.[152][153]
While many of his late paintings are somber, they can be seen as essentially optimistic and reflective
of a desire to return to lucid mental health. Yet some of his final works reflect deepening concerns.
Referring to his paintings of wheatfields under troubled skies, he commented in a letter to his brother
Theo: "I did not have to go out of my way very much in order to try to express sadness and extreme
loneliness." Nevertheless, he mentions that: "these canvases will tell you what I cannot say in words,
that is, how healthy and invigorating I find the countryside."[154][155]
There has been much debate as to the source of Van Gogh's illness and its effect on his work. Over
150 psychiatrists have attempted to label its root, with some 30 different diagnoses.[156] Diagnoses
include schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, syphilis, poisoning from swallowed paints, temporal lobe
epilepsy, and acute intermittent porphyria. Any of these could have been the culprit, and could have
been aggravated by malnutrition, overwork, insomnia, and consumption of alcohol,
especially absinthe.
In Van Gogh: the Life (2011), biographers Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith argue that Van
Gogh did not commit suicide. They contend he was shot accidentally by two boys he knew who had
"a malfunctioning gun".[157] Experts at the Van Gogh Museum remain unconvinced.[158]
Work
The Old Mill, 1888, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY.
Starry Night Over the Rhone, 1888, Musée d'Orsay, Paris.
Olive Trees with the Alpilles in the Background, 1889, Museum of Modern Art, New York.
Main article: List of works by Vincent van Gogh
Van Gogh drew and painted with watercolors while at school—only a few survive and authorship is
challenged on some of those that do.[159] When he committed to art as an adult, he began at an
elementary level, copying the Cours de dessin, a drawing course edited by Charles Bargue. Within
two years he sought commissions. In spring 1882, his uncle, Cornelis Marinus, owner of a wellknown gallery of contemporary art in Amsterdam, asked him for drawings of the Hague. Van Gogh's
work did not live up to his uncle's expectations. Marinus offered a second commission, this time
specifying the subject matter in detail, but was once again disappointed with the result.
Nevertheless, Van Gogh persevered. He improved the lighting of his studio by installing variable
shutters and experimented with a variety of drawing materials. For more than a year he worked on
single figures – highly elaborated studies in "Black and White",[160] which at the time gained him only
criticism. Today, they are recognized as his first masterpieces.[161]
White House at Night, 1890, Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, painted six weeks before the
artist's death
Early in 1883, he began to work on multi-figure compositions, which he based on his drawings. 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. By Autumn 1882, his brother had enabled
him financially to turn out his first paintings, but all the money Theo could supply was soon spent.
Then, in spring 1883, Van Gogh turned to renowned Hague School artists
like Weissenbruch and Blommers, and received technical support from them, as well as from
painters like De Bock and Van der Weele, both second generation Hague School artists.[162]When he
moved to Nuenen after the intermezzo in Drenthe he began several large-sized paintings but
destroyed most of them. The Potato Eaters and its companion pieces – The Old Tower on the
Nuenen cemetery and The Cottage – are the only ones to have survived. Following a visit to
the Rijksmuseum, Van Gogh was aware that many of his faults were due to lack of technical
experience.[162] So in November 1885 he traveled to Antwerp and later to Paris to learn and develop
his skill.[163]
After becoming familiar with Impressionist and Neo-Impressionist techniques and theories, Van
Gogh went to Arles to develop on these new possibilities. But within a short time, older ideas on art
and work reappeared: ideas such as working with serial imagery on related or contrasting subject
matter, which would reflect on the purposes of art. As his work progressed, he painted many Selfportraits. Already in 1884 in Nuenen he had worked on a series that was to decorate the dining room
of a friend in Eindhoven. Similarly in Arles, in spring 1888 he arranged his Flowering Orchards into
triptychs, began a series of figures that found its end in The Roulin Family series, and finally, when
Gauguin had consented to work and live in Arles side-by-side with Van Gogh, he started to work
on The Décorations for the Yellow House, which was by some accounts the most ambitious effort he
ever undertook.[101] Most of his later work is involved with elaborating on or revising its fundamental
settings. In the spring of 1889, he painted another, smaller group of orchards. In an April letter to
Theo, he said, "I have 6 studies of Spring, two of them large orchards. There is little time because
these effects are so short-lived."[164]
Art historian Albert Boime believes that Van Gogh – even in seemingly fantastical compositions
like Starry Night – based his work in reality.[165] The White House at Night, shows a house at twilight
with a prominent star surrounded by a yellow halo in the sky. Astronomers at Southwest Texas State
University in San Marcos calculated that the star is Venus, which was bright in the evening sky in
June 1890 when Van Gogh is believed to have painted the picture.[166]
Self portraits
See also: Self-portraits by Vincent van Gogh
Self-Portrait with Straw Hat, Paris, Winter 1887/88,Metropolitan Museum of Art, (F365v)
Self-portrait, 1889,National Gallery of Art.
Van Gogh produced many self-portraits during his lifetime; he drew and painted himself more than
43 times between 1886 and 1889.[167][168] In all, the gaze of the painter is seldom directed at the
viewer; even when it is a fixed gaze, he appears to look elsewhere. The paintings vary in intensity
and color and some portray the artist with beard, some beardless, some with bandages – depicting
the episode in which he severed a portion of his ear. Self-portrait Without Beard, from late
September 1889, is one of the most expensive paintings of all time, selling for $71.5 million in 1998
in New York.[169] At the time, it was the third (or an inflation-adjusted fourth) most expensive painting
ever sold. It was also Van Gogh's last self-portrait, given as a birthday gift to his mother.[170]
All of the self-portraits painted in Saint-Rémy show the artist's head from the right, the side opposite
his mutilated ear, as he painted himself reflected in his mirror.[171][172][173] During the final weeks of his
life in Auvers-sur-Oise, he produced many paintings, but no self-portraits, a period in which he
returned to painting the natural world.[174]
Portraits
See also: Portraits by Vincent van Gogh and Paintings of Children (Van Gogh series)
L'Arlesienne: Madame Ginoux with Books, November 1888. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New
York City (F488)
Patience Escalier, second version August 1888, Private collection (F444)
La Mousmé, 1888,National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.
Le Zouave (half-figure), June 1888,Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam (F423)
Although Van Gogh is best known for his landscapes, he seemed to have believed that
portraits were his greatest ambition.[175] He said of portrait studies, "The only thing in
painting that excites me to the depths of my soul, and which makes me feel the infinite
more than anything else."[176]
He wrote to his sister that
I should like to paint portraits which appear after a century to people living then as
apparitions. By which I mean that I do not endeavor to achieve this through
photographic resemblance, but my means of our impassioned emotions – that is to say
using our knowledge and our modern taste for color as a means of arriving at the
expression and the intensification of the character.[175]
Cypresses
See also: Olive Trees (series)
Road with Cypress and Star, May 1890,Kröller-Müller Museum
Wheat Field with Cypresses, 1889, National Gallery, London
One of Van Gogh's most popular and widely known series is his cypresses. During the
summer of 1889, at sister Wil's request, he made several smaller versions of Wheat
Field with Cypresses.[177] These works are characterised by swirls and densely
painted impasto, and produced one of his best-known paintings, The Starry Night. Other
works from the series include Olive Trees with the Alpilles in the
Background (1889)Cypresses (1889), Cypresses with Two Figures (1889–1890), Wheat
Field with Cypresses (1889), (Van Gogh made several versions of this painting that
year), Road with Cypress and Star (1890), and Starry Night Over the Rhone (1888).
Hoping to obtain a gallery for his work, his undertook a series of paintings including Still
Life: Vase with Twelve Sunflowers (1888), and Starry Night Over the Rhone (1888), all
intended to form the décorations for the Yellow House.[178][179]
Flowering Orchards
See also: Flowering Orchards
Almond Blossoms, 1890
The series of Flowering Orchards, sometimes referred to as the Orchards in
Blossom paintings, were among the first groups of work that Van Gogh completed after
his arrival in Arles, Provence in February 1888. The 14 paintings in this group are
optimistic, joyous and visually expressive of the burgeoning Springtime. They are
delicately sensitive, silent, quiet and unpopulated. About The Cherry Tree Vincent wrote
to Theo on 21 April 1888 and said he had 10 orchards and: one big (painting) of a
cherry tree, which I've spoiled.[180] The following spring he painted another smaller group
of orchards, including View of Arles, Flowering Orchards.[164] Van Gogh was consumed
by the landscape and vegetation of the South of France, and often visited the farm
gardens near Arles. Because of the vivid light supplied by the Mediterranean climate his
palette significantly brightened.[181]
Flowers
See also: Sunflowers (series of paintings)
Van Gogh painted several versions of landscapes with flowers, including his View of
Arles with Irises, and paintings of flowers, including Irises, Sunflowers,[182] lilacs and
roses. Some reflect his interests in the language of color, and also in Japanese ukiyoe woodblock prints.[183]
View of Arles with Irises, 1888, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam.
Irises, 1889, Getty Center, Los Angeles
He completed two series of sunflowers. The first dated from his 1887 stay in Paris, the
second during his visit to Arles the following year. The Paris series shows living flowers
in the ground, in the second, they are dying in vases. The 1888 paintings were created
during a rare period of optimism for the artist. He intended them to decorate a bedroom
where Gauguin was supposed to stay in Arles that August, when the two would create
the community of artists Van Gogh had long hoped for. The flowers are rendered with
thick brushstrokes (impasto) and heavy layers of paint.[184]
In an August 1888 letter to Theo, he wrote,
I am hard at it, painting with the enthusiasm of a Marseillais eating bouillabaisse, which
won't surprise you when you know that what I'm at is the painting of some sunflowers. If
I carry out this idea there will be a dozen panels. So the whole thing will be a symphony
in blue and yellow. I am working at it every morning from sunrise on, for the flowers fade
so quickly. I am now on the fourth picture of sunflowers. This fourth one is a bunch of 14
flowers ... it gives a singular effect.[184]
Wheat fields
Wheatfield with Crows, 1890, Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam
See also: Wheat Fields (Van Gogh series) and The Wheat Field
Van Gogh made several excursions into nature during his time around Arles. His
paintings include harvests, wheat fields, and other rural landmarks from the area,
including The Old Mill (1888); a good example of a picturesque structure bordering the
wheat fields.[185] This was one of seven canvases sent to Pont-Aven on 4 October 1888
in exchange for works with Paul Gauguin, Émile Bernard, Charles Laval and
others.[185]At various times Van Gogh painted the view from his window – at The Hague,
Antwerp, and Paris. They culminate in The Wheat Field series, which depict the scene
visible from his adjoining cells in the Saint-Rémy asylum.[186]
Writing in July 1890, after he had already moved to Auvers, Van Gogh said that he had
become absorbed "in the immense plain against the hills, boundless as the sea, delicate
yellow."[187] He had become captivated by the fields in May when the wheat was young
and green. The weather worsened in July, and he wrote to Theo of "vast fields of wheat
under troubled skies", adding that he did not "need to go out of my way to try and
express sadness and extreme loneliness."[188] In particular, the work Wheatfield with
Crows serves as a compelling and poignant expression of the artist's state of mind in his
final days, a painting Hulsker discusses as being associated with "melancholy and
extreme loneliness," a painting with a "somber and threatening aspect", a "doom-filled
painting with threatening skies and ill-omened crows."[189] Hulsker identifies seven oil
paintings as following the completion of the Wheatfield with Crows in July 1890 while in
Auvers.[190]
Legacy
Posthumous fame
Main article: Posthumous fame of Vincent van Gogh
Painter on the Road to Tarascon, August 1888, Vincent van Gogh on the road to Montmajour, oil on
canvas, 48 × 44 cm., formerly Museum Magdeburg, believed to have been destroyed by fire in World
War II
Following his first exhibitions in the late 1880s, Van Gogh's fame grew steadily among
colleagues, art critics, dealers, and collectors.[191] After his death, memorial exhibitions
were mounted in Brussels, Paris, The Hague, and Antwerp. In the early 20th century,
there were retrospectives in Paris (1901 and 1905) and Amsterdam (1905), and
important group exhibitions in Cologne(1912), New York (1913), and Berlin
(1914).[192] These had a noticeable impact on later generations of artists. [193] By the mid
20th century, Van Gogh was seen as one of the greatest and most recognizable
painters in history.[194][195] In 2007, a group of Dutch historians compiled the "Canon of
Dutch History" to be taught in schools, and included Van Gogh as one of the fifty topics
of the canon, alongside other national icons such as Rembrandt and De Stijl.[196]
Together with those of Pablo Picasso, Van Gogh's works are among the world's most
expensive paintings ever sold, based on data from auctions and private sales. Those
sold for over US$100 million (today's equivalent) include Portrait of Dr.
Gachet,[197] Portrait of Joseph Roulin, and Irises. A Wheatfield with Cypresses was sold
in 1993 for US$57 million, a spectacularly high price at the time, while his Self Portrait
with Bandaged Ear was sold privately in the late 1990s for an estimated
US$80/$90 million.[198]
Influence
In his final letter to Theo, Vincent mentioned that he was childless and he viewed his
paintings as his progeny. The historian Simon Schama said that Vincent "did have a
child of course, Expressionism, and many, many heirs." Schama mentioned other artists
who have adapted elements of Van Gogh's style, including Willem de Kooning, Howard
Hodgkin and Jackson Pollock.[199] The Abstract Expressionism of the 1940s and 1950s is
seen as in part inspired from Van Gogh's broad, gestural brush strokes. In the words of
art critic Sue Hubbard: "At the beginning of the twentieth century Van Gogh gave the
Expressionists a new painterly language that enabled them to go beyond surface
appearance and penetrate deeper essential truths. It is no coincidence that at this very
moment Freud was mining the depths of that essentially modern domain –
the subconscious. This beautiful and intelligent exhibition places Van Gogh where he
firmly belongs; as the trailblazer of modern art."[200]
In 1947, Antonin Artaud, who himself suffered from multiple mental disorders, was
invited by the art dealer Pierre Loeb to write on Van Gogh as a great retrospective of his
works opened at the Orangerie in Paris.[201] This led to the book Van Gogh le suicidé de
la société (Van Gogh, The Man Suicided by Society), in which Artaud argued that Van
Gogh's psychological condition was to be understood as a superior lucidity
misunderstood by his contemporaries.[202] 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 World War II. Bacon was inspired by not only an
image he described as "haunting", but Van Gogh himself, whom he regarded as an
alienated outsider, a position which resonated with him. Bacon further identified with
Van Gogh's theories of art, and quoted lines written in a letter to Theo: "[R]eal painters
do not paint things as they are ... [T]hey paint them as they themselves feel them to
be."[203]
An exhibition devoted to Vincent van Gogh's letters took place in the Van Gogh
Museum in Amsterdam from October 2009 to January 2010,[204] and moved to theRoyal
Academy in London from late January to April.[205] From 1 May 2013 to 12 January 2014,
the Van Gogh Museum hosted an exhibition entitled Van Gogh at Work, featuring 200
paintings and drawings, 150 of them by Van Gogh and others including Paul
Gauguin and Émile Bernard.[206]
Footnotes
1. Jump up^ The pronunciation of "Van Gogh" varies in both
English and Dutch. Especially in British English it
is /ˌvæn ˈɡɒx/ van-GOKH or sometimes /ˌvæn ˈɡɒf/ van-GOF.
U.S. dictionaries list /ˌvæn ˈɡoʊ/ van-GOH, with a silent gh, as
the most common pronunciation. In the dialect of Holland, it
is [ˈvɪnsɛnt fɑŋˈxɔx] ( listen), with a voiceless V. He grew up in
Brabant (although his parents were not born there), and used
Brabant dialect in his writing; it is therefore likely that he himself
pronounced his name with a Brabant accent: [vɑɲˈʝɔç], with a
voiced V and palatalized G and gh. In France, where much of
his work was produced, it is [vɑ̃ ɡɔɡə][citation needed]
2. Jump up^ It has been suggested that being given the same
name as his dead elder brother might have had a deep
psychological impact on the young artist, and that elements of
his art, such as the portrayal of pairs of male figures, can be
traced back to this. See Lubin (1972), 82–84.
3. Jump up^ "...he would not eat meat, only a little morsel on
Sundays, and then only after being urged by our landlady for a
long time. Four potatoes with a suspicion of gravy and a
mouthful of vegetables constituted his whole dinner" – from a
letter to Frederik van Eeden, to help him with preparation for his
article on Van Gogh in De Nieuwe Gids, Issue 1, December
1890. Quoted in Van Gogh: A Self-Portrait; Letters Revealing
His Life as a Painter. W. H. Auden, New York Graphic Society,
Greenwich, CT. (1961), 37–39
4. Jump up^ Letter 129, April 1879, and Letter 132. Van Gogh
lodged in Wasmes at 22 rue de Wilson with Jean-Baptiste
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
Denis, a breeder or grower (cultivateur, in the French original)
according to Letter 553b. In the recollections of his nephew
Jean Richez, gathered by Wilkie (in the 1970s!), 72–8. Denis
and his wife Esther were running a bakery, and Richez admits
that the only source of his knowledge is Aunt Esther.
Jump up^ There are different views as to this period; Jan
Hulsker (1990) opts for a return to the Borinage and then back
to Etten in this period; Dorn, in: Ges7kó (2006), 48 & note 12
supports the line taken in this article
Jump up^ see Jan Hulsker's speech The Borinage Episode
and the Misrepresentation of Vincent van Gogh, Van Gogh
Symposium, 10–11 May 1990. In Erickson (1998), 67–68
Jump up^ Johannes de Looyer, Karel van Engeland,
Hendricus Dekkers, and Piet van Hoorn all as old men recalled
being paid 5, 10 or 50 cents per nest, depending on the type of
bird. See Theo's son's Webexhibits.org
Jump up^ The girl was Gordina de Groot, who died in 1927;
she claimed the child's father was not Van Gogh, but a relative.
Jump up^ Vincent's doctor was Hubertus Amadeus Cavenaile.
Wilkie, 143–46
Jump up^ Arnold, 77. The direct evidence for syphilis is thin,
coming solely from interviews with the grandson of the doctor;
see Tralbaut (1981), 177–78, and for a review of the evidence
overall see Naifeh and Smith 477 n. 199
Jump up^ According to Doiteau & Leroy, the diagonal cut
removed the lobe and probably a little more.
Jump up^ Gauguin, who had spent the night in a nearby hotel,
arrived independently at the same time.
Jump up^ They continued to correspond and in 1890 Gauguin
proposed they form an artist studio in Antwerp. See Pickvance
(1986),62
References
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
Jump up^ Hughes (1990), 144
^ Jump up to:a b Pickvance (1986), 129
Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 39
^ Jump up to:a b Pomerans (1996), ix
Jump up^ "Van Gogh: The Letters", vangoghletters.org;
retrieved 7 October 2009.
Jump up^ Van Gogh's letters, Unabridged and Annotated,
webexhibits.org; retrieved 25 June 2009.
^ Jump up to:a b c d Hughes (1990), 143
Jump up^ Pomerans (1996), i–xxvi
Jump up^ Pomerans (1997), xiii
Jump up^ Vincent Van Gogh Biography, Quotes &
Paintings, The Art History Archive; retrieved 12 July 2011.
Jump up^ Pomerans (1997), pg. 1
Jump up^ Erickson (1998), 9
13. Jump up^ Van Gogh-Bonger, Johanna. "Memoir of Vincent van
Gogh". Van Gogh's Letters. Retrieved 12 July 2011.
14. Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 24
15. Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 25–35
16. Jump up^ Hulsker (1984), 8–9
17. Jump up^ Letter 347, Vincent to Theo, 18 December
1883. Van Gogh's Letters at webexhibits.org; retrieved 12 July
2011.
18. Jump up^ Letter 7 Vincent to Theo, 5 May 1873. Van Gogh's
Letters. Retrieved 12 July 2011.
19. Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 35–47
20. Jump up^ "Vincent van Gogh walked through
Brentford". Brentford Dock. Retrieved11 May 2014.
21. Jump up^ "Blue plaque record". Retrieved 11 May 2014.
22. Jump up^ Letter from Vincent to Theo, August 1876. Van
Gogh's Letters. Retrieved 12 July 2011.
23. Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 47–56.
24. Jump up^ Callow (1990), 54
25. Jump up^ See the recollections gathered in Dordrecht by M. J.
Brusse, Nieuwe Rotterdamsche Courant, 26 May and 2 June
1914.
26. Jump up^ McQuillan (1989), 26
27. Jump up^ Erickson (1998), 23
28. Jump up^ Hulsker (1990), 60–62, 73
29. Jump up^ Letter from mother to Theo, 7 August 1879 Van
Gogh's Letters, and Callow, work cited, 72
30. Jump up^ Letter 158 Vincent to Theo, 18 November 1881. Van
Gogh's Letters; retrieved 12 July 2011.
31. Jump up^ Letter 134, Van Gogh's Letters, 20 August 1880
from Cuesmes
32. Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981) 67–71
33. Jump up^ Van Gogh Museum official website; accessed 20
November 2014. Archived14 July 2014 at the Wayback
Machine
34. Jump up^ Erickson (1998), 5
35. Jump up^ Letter 153 Vincent to Theo, 3 November 1881
36. Jump up^ "179". vangoghletters.org.
37. Jump up^ Letter 161 Vincent to Theo, 23 November 1881
38. Jump up^ Letter 164 Vincent to Theo, from Etten c.21
December 1881, describing the visit in more detail
39. Jump up^ Letter Letter 193 from Vincent to Theo, The Hague,
14 May 1882.
40. Jump up^ "Uncle Stricker", as Van Gogh refers to him in letters
to Theo.
41. Jump up^ Gayford (2006), 130–1
42. Jump up^ Pomerans (1997), 112
43. Jump up^ Letter 166 Vincent to Theo, 29 December 1881
44. Jump up^ "Letter 194: To Theo van Gogh. The Hague,
Thursday, 29 December 1881".Vincent van Gogh: The
Letters. Van Gogh Museum. Note 2. Retrieved20
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81.
November 2014. At Christmas I had a rather violent argument
with Pa ...
Jump up^ "Letter 196". Vincent van Gogh. The Letters.
Amsterdam: Van Gogh Museum.
Jump up^ "Letter 219". Vincent van Gogh. The Letters.
Amsterdam: Van Gogh Museum.
Jump up^ McQuillan, 34
Jump up^ Letter 206, Vincent to Theo, 8 June/9 June 1882
Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 110
Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 96–103
Jump up^ Callow (1990), 116; cites the work of Hulsker;
Callow (1990), 123–124
Jump up^ "Letter 224". Vincent van Gogh. The Letters.
Amsterdam: Van Gogh Museum.
Jump up^ Callow (1990), 117,116; citing the research of Jan
Hulsker; the two dead children were born in 1874 and 1879.
^ Jump up to:a b Tralbaut (1981), 107
Jump up^ Callow (1990), 132; Tralbaut (1981), 102–104, 112
Jump up^ Arnold, 38
Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 113
Jump up^ Wilkie, 185
Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981),101–107
^ Jump up to:a b Tralbaut (1981), 111–22
Jump up^ Vincent's nephew noted some reminiscences of
local residents in 1949, including the description of the speed of
his drawing
Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 154
Jump up^ McQuillan, p. 127
Jump up^ Vincent Van Gogh and Gordina de Groot,
vangoghaventure.com; accessed 20 November 2014.
Jump up^ Hulsker (1980) 196–205
Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 123–160
Jump up^ Callow (1990), 181
Jump up^ Callow (1990), 184
Jump up^ Hammacher (1985), 84
Jump up^ Callow (1990), 253
Jump up^ Van der Wolk (1987), 104–105
Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 173
Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981) 187–192
Jump up^ Pickvance (1984), 38–39
Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 216
Jump up^ Letter 626a. Retrieved 24 August 2010.
Jump up^ Van Gogh et Monticelli. Retrieved 24 August 2010.
Jump up^ Turner, J. (2000), 314
Jump up^ Pickvance (1986), 62–63
Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 212–13
Jump up^ "Glossary term: Pointillism", National
Gallery London. Retrieved 13 September 2007.
82. Jump up^ "Glossary term: Complimentary colours", National
Gallery, London. Retrieved 13 September 2007.
83. Jump up^ D. Druick & P. Zegers, Van Gogh and Gauguin: The
Studio of the South,Thames & Hudson, 2001. 81; Gayford,
(2006), 50
84. Jump up^ Hulsker (1990), 256
85. Jump up^ Letter 510 Vincent to Theo, 15 July 1888.
Letter 544a. Vincent to Paul Gauguin, 3 October 1888.
86. ^ Jump up to:a b Hughes, 144
87. Jump up^ "Letters of Vincent van Gogh." Penguin, 1998.
348. ISBN 0-14-044674-5
88. Jump up^ Nemeczek, Alfred (1999), 59–61.
89. Jump up^ Gayford (2006), 16
90. Jump up^ Callow (1990), 219
91. Jump up^ Pickvance (1984), 175–76, and Dorn (1990), passim
92. Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), p. 266
93. ^ Jump up to:a b Pomerans (1997), 356, 360
94. Jump up^ "Fishing Boats on the Beach at Saintes-Maries-dela-Mer, 1888". Permanent Collection. Van Gogh Museum.
2005–11; retrieved 18 May 2011. Archived 26 April 2014 at
the Wayback Machine
95. Jump up^ "Article de l'oreille coupée de Vincent Van Gogh in
le Forum Républicain du 30 décembre 1888" (in
French). Bibliothèque numérique patrimoniale de la
médiathèque d'Arles. External link in |publisher= (help)
96. Jump up^ Hulsker (1980), 380–82.
97. Jump up^ Hulsker (1980), 356
98. Jump up^ Pickvance (1984), 168–169;206
99. Jump up^ Letter 534; Gayford (2006), 18
100. Jump up^ Letter 537; Nemeczek, 61
101. ^ Jump up to:a b See Dorn (1990)
102. Jump up^ Pickvance (1984), 234–35
103. Jump up^ Hulsker (1980), 374–6
104. Jump up^ "Letter 719 to Theo van Gogh. Arles, Sunday, 11
or Monday, 12 November 1888". Vincent van Gogh: The
Letters. Van Gogh Museum. 1v:3. I've been working on two
canvases.
A reminiscence of our garden at Etten with cabbages,
cypresses, dahlias and figures ...Gauguin gives me courage to
imagine, and the things of the imagination do indeed take on a
more mysterious character.
105. Jump up^ Gayford (2006), 61
106. Jump up^ Pickvance (1984), 195
107. Jump up^ Gayford (2007), 274–77
108. ^ Jump up to:a b Gauguin, Paul. "Avant et
Après". vggallery.com. External link in|publisher= (help)
109. Jump up^ Sweetman, pg. 1
110. Jump up^ Tralbaut, 258
111. Jump up^ Naifeh and Smith, 702
112. Jump up^ Gayford (2007), 277
113. Jump up^ Martin Bailey, The Art Newspaper, Van Gogh's
Own Words After Cutting His Ear Recorded in Paris Newspaper
114. Jump up^ "Van Gogh's Ear". Van Gogh Gallery. Van Gogh
Gallery. 2002–2013. Retrieved 7 November 2013.
115. Jump up^ Hulsker, 380–82
116. Jump up^ Naifeh and Smith 707-8
117. ^ Jump up to:a b c d "Concordance, lists, bibliography:
Documentation". Vincent van Gogh: The Letters. Van Gogh
Museum.
118. Jump up^ Naifeh/Smith, 488–89/209–10
119. Jump up^ Jules Breton and Realism, Van Gogh
Museum Archived 26 April 2014 at the Wayback Machine
120. Jump up^ Pickvance (1984), 102–103
121. Jump up^ Pickvance (1986), 154–157
122. Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 286
123. Jump up^ Hulsker (1990), 434
124. ^ Jump up to:a b Gayford, 284
125. Jump up^ Pickvance (1986). Chronology, 239–42
126. Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 265–273
127. Jump up^ Hughes (1990), 145
128. Jump up^ Callow (1990), 246
129. Jump up^ "To Theo van Gogh. Saint-Rémy-de-Provence,
Tuesday, 29 April 1890.".Vincent van Gogh: The
Letters. Vincent van Gogh Museum. Retrieved 9 February2012.
130. ^ Jump up to:a b Hulsker (1990), 390, 404
131. Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 287
132. Jump up^ Pickvance (1986) 175–177
133. ^ Jump up to:a b Hulsker (1990), 440
134. Jump up^ Aurier, G. Albert. "The Isolated Ones: Vincent van
Gogh", January 1890. Reproduced on vggallery.com. Retrieved
25 June 2009.
135. Jump up^ Rewald (1978), 346–347; 348–350
136. Jump up^ Tralbaut (1981), 293
137. Jump up^ Kleiner, Carolyn (24 July 2000). "Van Gogh's
vanishing act". Mysteries of History (U.S. News & World
Report). Archived from the original on 31 January 2011.
Retrieved 7 May 2011.
138. Jump up^ Letter 648 Vincent to Theo, 10 July 1890
139. Jump up^ "Letter 863". Vincent van Gogh: The Letters. Van
Gogh Museum. Retrieved17 July 2011.
140. Jump up^ Rosenblum, Robert (1975), 98–100
141. Jump up^ Pickvance (1986), 270–271
142. Jump up^ Hulsker (1980), 480–483. Wheat Field with
Crows is work number 2117 of 2125
143. Jump up^ Walther 2000, p. 74.
144. Jump up^ Hughes (2002), 8
145. ^ Jump up to:a b Sweetman (1990), 342–343
146. Jump up^ Metzger and Walther (1993), 669
147. Jump up^ Hulsker (1980), 480–483
148. Jump up^ Pomerans (1997), 509
149. Jump up^ "Letter from Emile Bernard to Albert". Van Gogh's
Letters; retrieved 17 July 2011.
150. Jump up^ Hayden, Deborah . POX, Genius, Madness and
the Mysteries of Syphilis. Basic Books, 2003. 152. ISBN 0-46502881-0
151. Jump up^ van der Veen, Wouter; Knapp, Peter (2010). Van
Gogh in Auvers: His Last Days. Monacelli Press. pp. 260–
264. ISBN 978-1-58093-301-8.
152. Jump up^ "La tombe de Vincent Van Gogh – Auvers-surOise, France". Groundspeak. Retrieved 23 June 2009.
153. Jump up^ Sweetman (1990), 367
154. Jump up^ Vincent van Gogh, "Letter to Theo van Gogh,
written c. 10 July 1890 in Auvers-sur-Oise", translated by
Johanna van Gogh-Bonger, edited by Robert Harrison, letter
number 649; retrieved 1 August 2011.
155. Jump up^ Rosenblum, Robert (1975), 100
156. Jump up^ Blumer, Dietrich. American Journal of
Psychiatry (2002)
157. Jump up^ Gompertz, Will (17 October 2011). "Van Gogh did
not kill himself, authors claim". BBC News. Retrieved 17
October 2011.
158. Jump up^ Max, Arthur (17 October 2011). "Van Gogh
museum unconvinced by new theory painter didn't commit
suicide but was shot by accident by two boys".Winnipeg Free
Press. Associated Press. Retrieved 11 December 2012.
159. Jump up^ Van Heugten (1996), 246–51
160. Jump up^ Artists working in Black & White, i.e., for illustrated
papers like The Graphic orIllustrated London News were among
Van Gogh's favorites. See Pickvance (1974/75)
161. Jump up^ See Dorn, Keyes & alt. (2000)
162. ^ Jump up to:a b See Dorn, Schröder & Sillevis, ed. (1996)
163. Jump up^ See Welsh-Ovcharov & Cachin (1988)
164. ^ Jump up to:a b Hulsker (1980), 385
165. Jump up^ Boime (1989)
166. Jump up^ At around 8:00 pm on 16 June 1890, as
astronomers determined by Venus's position in the
painting. Star dates Van Gogh canvas, BBC News, 8 March
2001.
167. Jump up^ "Musée d'Orsay: Vincent van Gogh SelfPortrait". musee-orsay.fr. 4 February 2009.
168. Jump up^ Encyclopedia of Irish and World Art: "art of selfportrait"; retrieved 13 June 2010.
169. Jump up^ "Top-ten most expensive paintings". Chiff.com;
retrieved 13 June 2010.
170. Jump up^ Pickvance, R. Van Gogh in Arles (exh. cat.
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York: Abrams, 1984; ISBN 087099-375-5 p131
171. Jump up^ Cohen, Ben. "A Tale of Two Ears", Journal of the
Royal Society of Medicine. June 2003. vol. 96. issue 6;
retrieved 24 August 2010.
172. Jump up^ Van Gogh Myths; The ear in the mirror. Letter to
the New York Times, 17 September 1989; retrieved 24 August
2010.
173. Jump up^ Self Portraits, Van Gogh Gallery; retrieved 24
August 2010.
174. Jump up^ Metzger and Walther (1993), 653
175. ^ Jump up to:a b Cleveland Museum of Art (2007). Monet to
Dalí: Impressionist and Modern Masterworks from the
Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum
of Art. p. 67. ISBN 978-0-940717-89-3.
176. Jump up^ "La Mousmé". Postimpressionism. National
Gallery of Art. 2011. Retrieved20 March 2011Additional
information about the painting is found in the audio clip.
177. Jump up^ Pickvance (1986), 132–33
178. Jump up^ Pickvance (1984), 175–76
179. Jump up^ Letter 595 Vincent to Theo, 17 or 18 June 1889
180. Jump up^ Pickvance (1984),45–53
181. Jump up^ Fell (1997), 32
182. Jump up^ "Letter 573" Vincent to Theo. 22 or 23 January
1889
183. Jump up^ Pickvance (1986), 80–81; 184–87
184. ^ Jump up to:a b "Sunflowers 1888." National Gallery, London;
retrieved 12 September 2009.
185. ^ Jump up to:a b Pickvance (1984), 177
186. Jump up^ Hulsker (1980), 390–94
187. Jump up^ Edwards, Cliff. Van Gogh and God: A Creative
Spiritual Quest. Loyola University Press, 1989, 115; ISBN 08294-0621-2
188. Jump up^ Letter 649
189. Jump up^ Hulsker (1990), 478–479
190. Jump up^ Hulsker (1990).
191. Jump up^ John Rewald, Studies in Post-Impressionism, The
Posthumous Fate of Vincent van Gogh 1890–1970, 244–54,
published by Harry N. Abrams (1986); ISBN 0-8109-1632-0.
192. Jump up^ See Dorn, Leeman & alt. (1990)
193. Jump up^ Rewald, John. "The posthumous fate of Vincent
van Gogh 1890–1970",Museumjournaal, August–September
1970, Rewald (1986), 248
194. Jump up^ "Vincent van Gogh The Dutch Master of Modern
Art has his Greatest American Show," Life Magazine, 10
October 1949, 82–87.
195. Jump up^ "Biography". National Gallery of Art, Washington
D.C. Archived from the original on 17 April 2006. Retrieved 19
July 2015.
196. Jump up^ "The Canon of the Netherlands". De Canon van
Nederland. Foundation entoen.nu. 2007. Retrieved 10
July 2009.
197. Jump up^ Andrew Decker, "The Silent Boom", Artnet.com.
Retrieved 14 September 2011.
198. Jump up^ G. Fernández, "The Most Expensive Paintings
ever sold", TheArtWolf.com; retrieved 14 September 2011.
199. Jump up^ Schama, Simon. "Wheatfield with Crows". Simon
Schama's Power of Art (2006 documentary), from 59:20.
200. Jump up^ Hubbard, Sue. Vincent Van Gogh and
Expressionism, suehubbard.com; retrieved 3 July
2010. Archived 6 June 2013 at the Wayback Machine
201. Jump up^ Isabelle Cahn (dir.), Van Gogh/Artaud. Le suicidé
de la société, Paris: Musée d'Orsay/Skira, 2014.
202. Jump up^ Van Gogh, Artaud. The suicide of society. Musée
d'Orsay. Retrieved 2 January 2015. See the Paris exhibition
dedicated to the links between Van Gogh and Artaud, "Van
Gogh/Artaud. Le suicidé de la société", which ran from March
until July 2014 at the Musée d'Orsay, and resulted in the
exhibition catalogue Isabelle Cahn (dir.), Van Gogh/Artaud. Le
suicidé de la société, Paris: Musée d'Orsay/Skira, 2014.
203. Jump up^ Farr, Dennis, Michael Peppiatt & Sally
Yard. Francis Bacon: A Retrospective. Harry N. Abrams (1999).
112. ISBN 0-8109-2925-2
204. Jump up^ Exhibition of van Gogh letters,
theartnewspaper.com; retrieved 7 October 2009.
205. Jump up^ "The Real Van Gogh: The Artist and His
Letters". Royal Academy of Arts. Archived from the original on
23 March 2010. Retrieved 24 March 2010.
206. Jump up^ Profile, nytimes/com, 30 April 2013; accessed 20
November 2014.
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Bernard, Bruce. Vincent by Himself. London: Time Warner,
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Callow, Philip. Vincent van Gogh: A Life. Chicago: Ivan R. Dee,
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Erickson, Kathleen Powers. At Eternity's Gate: The Spiritual Vision
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Gayford, Martin. The Yellow House: Van Gogh, Gauguin, and Nine
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Grossvogel, David I. Behind the Van Gogh Forgeries: A Memoir by
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Hammacher, A.M. Vincent van Gogh: Genius and Disaster. New
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Havlicek, William J. Van Gogh's Untold Journey. Amsterdam:
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Hughes, Robert. Nothing If Not Critical. London: The Harvill Press,
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Hulsker, J. The Complete Van Gogh. Oxford: Phaidon, 1980. ISBN
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Hughes, Robert. "Introduction." The Portable Van Gogh. New York:
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Lubin, Albert J. Stranger on the Earth: A Psychological Biography of
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Nemeczek, Alfred. Van Gogh in Arles. Prestel Verlag, 1999. ISBN
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Pomerans, Arnold. The Letters of Vincent van Gogh. London:
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Petrucelli, Alan W. Morbid Curiosity: The Disturbing Demises of the
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Rewald, John. Post-Impressionism: From van Gogh to Gauguin.
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Sund, Judy. Van Gogh. London: Phaidon, 2002. ISBN 0-7148-4084X
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Tralbaut, Marc Edo. Vincent van Gogh, le mal aimé. Edita,
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Van Heugten, Sjraar. Van Gogh The Master Draughtsman. London:
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Walther, Ingo F. & Metzger, Rainer. Van Gogh: the Complete
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Boime, Albert. Vincent van Gogh: Die Sternennacht-Die Geschichte
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Cachin, Françoise & Bogomila Welsh-Ovcharov. Van Gogh à
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Dorn, Roland, George Keyesm & alt. Van Gogh Face to Face: The
Portraits (exh. cat). Detroit, Boston & Philadelphia, 2000–01,
Thames & Hudson, London & New York, 2000;ISBN 0-89558-153-1
Druick, Douglas, Pieter Zegers & alt. Van Gogh and Gauguin-The
Studio of the South (exh. cat). Chicago & Amsterdam 2001–02,
Thames & Hudson, London & New York 2001; ISBN 0-500-51054-7
Fell, Derek. The Impressionist Garden, London: Frances Lincoln,
1997; ISBN 0-7112-1148-5
Geskó, Judit, ed. Van Gogh in Budapest. Budapest: Vince Books,
2006; ISBN 978-963-7063-34-3 (English); ISBN 963-7063-331 (Hungarian)
Ives, Colta, Stein, Susan Alyson & alt. Vincent van Gogh-The
Drawings. New Haven: YUP, 2005; ISBN 0-300-10720-X
Kōdera, Tsukasa. Vincent van Gogh-Christianity versus Nature.
Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 1990; ISBN 90-272-5333-1
Pickvance, Ronald. English Influences on Vincent van Gogh (exh.
cat). University of Nottingham & alt. 1974/75). London: Arts Council,
1974.
Pickvance, R. Van Gogh in Arles (exh. cat. Metropolitan Museum of
Art, New York: Abrams, 1984; ISBN 0-87099-375-5
Pickvance, R. Van Gogh In Saint-Rémy and Auvers (exh.
cat. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York: Abrams, 1986; ISBN 087099-477-8
Orton, Fred and Griselda Pollock. "Rooted in the Earth: A Van Gogh
Primer", in: Avant-Gardes and Partisans Reviewed. London:
Redwood Books, 1996; ISBN 0-7190-4398-0
Rosenblum, Robert (1975), Modern Painting and the Northern
Romantic Tradition: Friedrich to Rothko, New York: Harper &
Row; ISBN 0-06-430057-9
Schaefer, Iris, Caroline von Saint-George & Katja
Lewerentz: Painting Light. The hidden techniques of the
Impressionists. Milan: Skira, 2008; ISBN 88-6130-609-8
Turner, J. (2000). From Monet to Cézanne: late 19th-century
French artists. Grove Art. New York: St Martin's Press; ISBN 0-31222971-2
Van der Wolk, Johannes: De schetsboeken van Vincent van Gogh,
Meulenhoff/Landshoff, Amsterdam (1986); ISBN 90-290-8154-6;
translated to English: The Seven Sketchbooks of Vincent van Gogh:
a facsimile edition, New York: Abrams, 1987.
Van Heugten, Sjraar. "Radiographic images of Vincent van Gogh's
paintings in the collection of the Van Gogh Museum", Van Gogh
Museum Journal. 1995. pp. 63–85; ISBN 90-400-9796-8
Van Heugten, S. Vincent van Gogh Drawings, vol. 1, Bussum: V+K,
1996. ISBN 90-6611-501-7 (Dutch edition).
Van Uitert, Evert, et al. Van Gogh in Brabant: Paintings and
drawings from Etten and Nuenen (English). Zwolle: Waanders,
Zwolle (1987); ISBN 90-6630-104-X
Van Uitert, Evert, Louis van Tilborgh and Sjraar van
Heughten. Paintings (1990). (Centenary exhibition catalogue)
Amsterdam: Rijksmuseum Vincent van Gogh; accessed 20
November 2014.
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