home Health Van Gogh's biography is complete. Van Gogh short biography. Rural life away from politics

Van Gogh's biography is complete. Van Gogh short biography. Rural life away from politics

Vincent Willem van Gogh (Dutch. Vincent Willem van Gogh; March 30, 1853, Grotto-Zundert, near Breda, the Netherlands - July 29, 1890, Auvers-sur-Oise, France) was a Dutch post-impressionist painter.

Biography of Vincent van Gogh

Vincent Van Gogh was born in the Dutch town of Groot-Sundert on March 30, 1853. Van Gogh was the first child in the family (not counting the brother who was born dead). His father's name was Theodore Wang Gogh, and his mother's name was Karnelia. They had a large family: 2 sons and three daughters. In the Van Gogh family, all men, one way or another, dealt with paintings, or served the church. Already by 1869, without even finishing school, he began working in a company that sold paintings. In truth, Van Gogh was not good at selling paintings, but he had an unbounded love for painting, and he was also good at languages. In 1873, at the age of 20, he came to London, where he spent 2 years that changed his whole life.

In London, Van Gogh lived happily ever after. He had a very good salary, which was enough to visit various art galleries and museums. He even bought himself a top hat, which was simply indispensable in London. Everything went to the fact that Van Gogh could become a successful merchant, but ... as often happens, love, yes, love, got in the way of his career. Van Gogh fell unconsciously in love with the daughter of his landlady, but after learning that she was already engaged, he became very withdrawn into himself, became indifferent to his work. When he returned to Paris he was fired.

In 1877, Van Gogh began to live again in Holland, and increasingly found solace in religion. After moving to Amsterdam, he began to study as a priest, but soon dropped out, as the situation at the faculty did not suit him.

In 1886, at the beginning of March, Van Gogh moved to Paris to his brother Theo, and lived in his apartment. There he takes painting lessons from Fernand Cormon, and meets such personalities as Pissarro, Gauguin and many other artists. Very quickly he forgets all the darkness of Dutch life, and quickly gains respect as an artist. He draws clearly, brightly in the style of impressionism and post-impressionism.

Vincent Van Gogh, after spending 3 months in an evangelical school, which was located in Brussels, he became a preacher. He distributed money and clothes to the needy poor, although he himself was not well off. This aroused the suspicion of the authorities of the church, and his activities were banned. He did not lose heart, and found solace in drawing.

By the age of 27, Van Gogh understood what his calling in this life was, and decided that he must become an artist at all costs. Although Van Gogh took drawing lessons, he can be safely considered self-taught, because he himself studied many books, self-study books, copied paintings by famous artists. At first he thought of becoming an illustrator, but then, when he took lessons from his artist relative Anton Mouve, he painted his first works in oils.

It seems that life began to improve, but again Van Gogh began to be haunted by failures, and love ones at that.

His cousin Kay Vos became a widow. He liked her very much, but he received a refusal, which he experienced for a long time. In addition, because of Kei, he quarreled very seriously with his father. This quarrel was the reason for Vincent's move to The Hague. It was there that he met Clazina Maria Hoornik, who was a girl of easy virtue. Van Gogh lived with her for almost a year, and more than once he had to be treated for sexually transmitted diseases. He wanted to save this poor woman, and even considered marrying her. But then his family intervened, and thoughts of marriage were simply dispelled.

Returning to his homeland to his parents, who by that time had already moved to Nyonen, his skills began to improve.

He spent 2 years in his homeland. In 1885 Vincent settled in Antwerp, where he attended classes at the Academy of Arts. Then, in 1886, Van Gogh returned to Paris again, to his brother Theo, who throughout his life helped him, both morally and financially. France became the second home for Van Gogh. This is where he lived for the rest of his life. He didn't feel like a stranger. Van Gogh drank a lot and had a very explosive temper. He could be called a person who is difficult to deal with.

In 1888 he moved to Arles. The locals were not happy to see him in their town, which was located in the south of France. They considered him an abnormal lunatic. Despite this, Vincent found friends here, and felt quite good. Over time, he got the idea to create a settlement for artists here, which he shared with his friend Gauguin. Everything was going well, but there was a quarrel between the artists. Van Gogh rushed at Gauguin, who had already become an enemy, with a razor. Gauguin barely blew his legs, miraculously surviving. From the anger of failure, Van Gogh cut off part of his left ear. After spending 2 weeks in a psychiatric clinic, he returned there again in 1889, as he began to suffer from hallucinations.

In May 1890, he finally left the asylum for the mentally ill and went to Paris to his brother Theo and his wife, who had just given birth to a boy, who was named Vincent in honor of his uncle. Life began to improve, and Van Gogh was even happy, but his illness returned again. On July 27, 1890, Vincent van Gogh shot himself in the chest with a pistol. He died in the arms of his brother Theo, who loved him very much. Six months later, Theo also died. The brothers are buried in the Auvers cemetery nearby.

Creativity Van Gogh

Vincent van Gogh (1853 - 1890) is considered a great Dutch painter who had a very strong influence on impressionism in art. His works, created in a ten-year period, amaze with their color, negligence and roughness of the brushstroke, images of a mentally ill man, exhausted by suffering, who committed suicide.

Van Gogh became one of the greatest post-impressionist painters.

He can be considered self-taught, because. studied painting, copying the paintings of old masters. During his life in the Netherlands, Van G. painted pictures about the nature, work and life of peasants and workers, which he observed around (“The Potato Eaters”).

In 1886 he moved to Paris, entered the studio of F. Cormon, where he met A. Toulouse-Lautrec and E. Bernard. Under the influence of Impressionist painting and Japanese engraving, the artist's style changed: an intense color scheme and a wide, energetic brushstroke, characteristic of the late Van G. ("Clichy Boulevard", "Portrait of Papa Tanguy"), appeared.

In 1888 he moved to the south of France, to the town of Arles. It was the most fruitful period of the artist's work. During his life, Van G. created more than 800 paintings and 700 drawings in various genres, but his talent manifested itself most clearly in the landscape: it was in it that his choleric explosive temperament found an outlet. The moving, nervous pictorial texture of his paintings reflected the state of mind of the artist: he suffered from a mental illness, which eventually led him to suicide.

Features of creativity

“Much remains unclear and controversial to date in the pathography of this severe bionegative personality. We can assume syphilitic provocation of schizo-epileptic psychosis. His feverish creativity is quite comparable to the increased productivity of the brain before the onset of a syphilitic disease of the brain, as was the case with Nietzsche, Maupassant, Schumann. Van Gogh is a good example of how a mediocre talent, thanks to psychosis, turned into an internationally recognized genius.

“The peculiar bipolarity, so clearly expressed in the life and psychosis of this remarkable patient, is expressed in parallel in his artistic work. In essence, the style of his works remains the same all the time. Only winding lines are repeated more and more often, giving his paintings a spirit of unbridledness, which reaches its climax in his last work, where the upward aspiration and the inevitability of destruction, fall, annihilation are clearly emphasized. These two movements, the rising movement and the falling movement, form the structural basis of epileptic manifestations, just as the two poles form the basis of the epileptoid constitution.

“Van Gogh painted brilliant paintings in between attacks. And the main secret of his genius was the extraordinary purity of consciousness and a special creative upsurge that arose as a result of his illness between attacks. F.M. also wrote about this special state of consciousness. Dostoevsky, who at one time suffered from similar attacks of a mysterious mental disorder.

Bright colors of Van Gogh

Dreaming of a brotherhood of artists and collective creativity, he completely forgot that he himself was an incorrigible individualist, irreconcilable to the point of restraint in matters of life and art. But therein lay his strength. You need to have a sufficiently trained eye to distinguish Monet's paintings from those of Sisley, for example. But only once having seen the “Red Vineyards”, you will never confuse the works of Van Gogh with anyone else. Each line and stroke is the expression of his personality.

The dominant impressionist system is color. In the pictorial system, Van Gogh's manner, everything is equal and crumpled into one inimitable bright ensemble: rhythm, color, texture, line, form.

At first glance, this is somewhat of a stretch. Do the “red vineyards” push around with the unheard-of intensity color, is not the ringing chord of blue cobalt in the “Sea in Saint-Marie” active, is it not the dazzlingly pure and sonorous colors of the “Landscape in Auvers after the rain”, next to which, any impressionistic picture looks hopelessly faded?

Exaggeratedly bright, these colors have the ability to sound in any intonation throughout the entire emotional range - from burning pain to the most delicate shades of joy. The sounding colors either intertwine into a softly and subtly harmonized melody, or rear up in an ear-piercing dissonance. Just as in music there is a minor and major system, so the colors of the Vangogh palette are divided in two. For Van Gogh, cold and warm are like life and death. At the head of the opposing camps - yellow and blue, both colors - are deeply symbolic. However, this "symbolism" has the same living flesh as Vangogh's ideal of beauty.

Van Gogh saw a certain bright beginning in the yellow paint, from soft lemon to intense orange. The color of the sun and ripened bread in his understanding was the color of joy, solar warmth, human kindness, benevolence, love and happiness - all that in his understanding was included in the concept of "life". Opposite in meaning, blue, from blue to almost black-lead, is the color of sadness, infinity, longing, despair, mental anguish, fatal inevitability and, ultimately, death. Van Gogh's late paintings are the arena of the clash of these two colors. They are like a struggle between good and evil, daylight and night twilight, hope and despair. The emotional and psychological possibilities of color are the subject of Van Gogh's constant reflections: “I hope to make a discovery in this area, for example, to express the feelings of two lovers by combining two complementary colors, mixing and opposing them, by the mysterious vibration of related tones. Or to express the idea that has arisen in the brain with the radiance of a light tone against a dark background…”.

Speaking of Van Gogh, Tugendhold noted: "... the notes of his experiences are the graphic rhythms of things and the reciprocal heartbeats." The concept of rest is unknown to Vangogh art. His element is movement.

In the eyes of Van Gogh, it is the same life, which means the ability to think, feel, empathize. Take a look at the painting of the "red vineyards". The strokes, thrown onto the canvas by a swift hand, run, rush, collide, scatter again. Similar to dashes, dots, blots, commas, they are a transcript of Vangogh's vision. From their cascades and whirlpools, simplified and expressive forms are born. They are a line that forms into a drawing. Their relief, sometimes barely outlined, sometimes piled up in massive clumps, like plowed earth, forms a delightful, picturesque texture. And out of all this, a huge image arises: in the hot heat of the sun, like sinners on fire, vines wriggle, trying to break away from the fat purple earth, to escape from the hands of the winegrowers, and now the peaceful bustle of harvesting looks like a fight between man and nature.

So, it means that color still dominates? But aren't these colors at the same time rhythm, line, form, and texture? This is the most important feature of the pictorial language of Van Gogh, in which he speaks to us through his paintings.

It is often believed that Vangogh painting is a kind of uncontrollable emotional element, spurred on by unbridled insight. This delusion is “helped” by the originality of Van Gogh’s artistic manner, which really seems to be spontaneous, but in fact it is subtly calculated, thought out: “Work and sober calculation, the mind is extremely tense, like an actor’s when playing a difficult role, when you have to think about a thousand things within one half hour….”

Van Gogh's heritage and innovation

Van Gogh heritage

[Mother's sister] “... Seizures of epilepsy, which indicates a severe nervous heredity, which also affects Anna Cornelia herself. Naturally gentle and loving, she is prone to sudden outbursts of anger.
[Brother Theo] "...died six months after Vincent's suicide in the insane asylum in Utrecht, having lived for 33 years."
"None of Van Gogh's brothers and sisters had epilepsy, while it is absolutely certain that the younger sister suffered from schizophrenia and spent 32 years in a psychiatric hospital."

The human soul ... not cathedrals

Let's turn to Van Gogh:

“I prefer to paint the eyes of people, not cathedrals… the human soul, even the soul of an unfortunate beggar or a street girl, in my opinion, is much more interesting.”

“Those who write peasant life will stand the test of time better than the makers of cardinal devices and harems written in Paris.” “I will remain myself, and even in raw works I will say strict, rude, but truthful things.” “The worker against the bourgeois is not as well founded as the third estate against the other two a hundred years ago.”

Could a person who in these and a thousand similar statements so explained the meaning of life and art count on success with “the powers that be? ". The bourgeois environment uprooted Van Gogh.

Against rejection, Van Gogh had the only weapon - confidence in the correctness of the chosen path and work.

“Art is a struggle… it is better to do nothing than to express yourself weakly.” "You have to work like a few blacks." Even a half-starved existence is turned into a stimulus for creativity: “In the severe trials of poverty, you learn to look at things with completely different eyes.”

The bourgeois public does not forgive innovation, and Van Gogh was an innovator in the most direct and true sense of the word. His reading of the sublime and beautiful went through an understanding of the inner essence of objects and phenomena: from as insignificant as torn shoes to crushing cosmic hurricanes. The ability to present these seemingly disparate values on an equally huge artistic scale put Van Gogh not only outside the official aesthetic concept of academic artists, but also forced him to go beyond the scope of impressionistic painting.

Quotes by Vincent van Gogh

(from letters to brother Theo)

There is nothing more artistic than loving people.
When something in you says: "You are not an artist," immediately begin to write, my boy - only in this way will you silence this inner voice. The one who, having heard it, runs to his friends and complains about his misfortune, loses part of his courage, part of the best that is in him.
And one should not take one's shortcomings too close to one's heart, for the one who does not have them still suffers from one thing - the absence of shortcomings; but he who thinks he has attained perfect wisdom will do well to become foolish again.
A man carries a bright flame in his soul, but no one wants to bask near it; passers-by notice only the smoke leaving through the chimney, and pass on their way.
Reading books, as well as looking at pictures, one should neither doubt nor hesitate: one must be self-confident and find beautiful that which is beautiful.
What is drawing? How are they mastered? This is the ability to break through the iron wall that stands between what you feel and what you can do. How is it possible to get through such a wall? In my opinion, it is useless to beat your head against it, you need to slowly and patiently dig in and gouge it.
Blessed is he who has found his work.
I prefer not to say anything at all than to express myself indistinctly.
I confess that I also need beauty and sublimity, but even more something else, for example: kindness, responsiveness, tenderness.
You are a realist yourself, so bear with my realism.
A person only needs to unfailingly love what is worthy of love, and not squander his feeling on insignificant, unworthy and insignificant things.
It is impossible for melancholy to stagnate in our souls, like water in a swamp.
When I see the weak being trampled on, I begin to question the value of what is called progress and civilization.

Bibliography

Van Gogh.Letters. Per. with a goal - L.-M., 1966.
Rewald J. Post-Impressionism. Per. from English. T. 1. - L.-M, 1962.
Perryusho A. Life of Van Gogh. Per. from French - M., 1973.
Murina Elena.Van Gogh. - M.: Art, 1978. - 440 p. - 30,000 copies.
Dmitrieva N. A. Vincent Van Gogh. Man and artist. - M., 1980.
Stone I. Lust for Life (book). The Tale of Vincent Van Gogh. Per. from English. - M., Pravda, 1988.
Constantino Porcu Van Gogh. Zijn leven en de kunst. (from the Kunstklassiekers series) Netherlands, 2004.
Wolf Stadler Vincent van Gogh. (from the De Grote Meesters series) Amsterdam Boek, 1974.
Frank Kools Vincent van Gogh en zijn geboorteplaats: als een boer van Zundert. De Walburg Pers, 1990.
G. Kozlov, "The Legend of Van Gogh", "Around the World", No. 7, 2007.
Van Gogh V. Letters to friends / Per. from fr. P.Melkova. - St. Petersburg: ABC, ABC-Atticus, 2012. - 224 p. - ABC-classic series - 5,000 copies, ISBN 978-5-389-03122-7
Gordeeva M., Perova D. Vincent Van Gogh / In the book: Great Artists - V.18 - Kiev, CJSC "Komsomolskaya Pravda - Ukraine", 2010. - 48 p.

(Vincent Willem Van Gogh) was born March 30, 1853 in the village of Groot-Zundert in the province of North Brabant in the south of the Netherlands in the family of a Protestant pastor.

In 1868, Van Gogh left school, after which he went to work in a branch of a large Parisian art company, Goupil & Cie. Successfully worked in the gallery, first in The Hague, then in offices in London and Paris.

By 1876, Vincent finally lost interest in the painting trade and decided to follow in his father's footsteps. In the UK, he found work as a teacher at a boarding school in a small town outside London, where he also served as an assistant pastor. On October 29, 1876, he gave his first sermon. In 1877 he moved to Amsterdam, where he studied theology at the university.

Van Gogh "Poppies"

In 1879, Van Gogh obtained a position as lay preacher at Vama, a mining center in the Borinage, in southern Belgium. He then continued his preaching mission in the nearby village of Kem.

In the same period, Van Gogh had a desire to paint.

In 1880, in Brussels, he entered the Royal Academy of Arts (Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts de Bruxelles). However, due to his unbalanced nature, he soon dropped out of the course and continued his art education on his own, using reproductions.

In 1881 in Holland, under the guidance of his relative, the landscape painter Anton Mauve, Van Gogh created his first paintings: "Still Life with Cabbage and Wooden Shoes" and "Still Life with a Beer Glass and Fruit".

In the Dutch period, starting with the painting "Potato Harvesting" (1883), the main motif of the artist's canvases was the theme of ordinary people and their work, the emphasis was on the expressiveness of scenes and figures, dark, gloomy colors and shades, sharp changes in light and shadow prevailed in the palette. . The masterpiece of this period is the canvas "Potato Eaters" (April-May 1885).

In 1885 Van Gogh continued his studies in Belgium. In Antwerp, he entered the Royal Academy of Fine Arts (The Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp). In 1886, Vincent moved to Paris to live with his younger brother Theo, who had by then taken over as the leading manager of the Goupil gallery in Montmartre. Here, Van Gogh took lessons from the French realist painter Fernand Cormon for about four months, met the Impressionists Camille Pizarro, Claude Monet, Paul Gauguin, from whom he adopted their style of painting.

In Paris, Van Gogh developed an interest in creating images of human faces. Having no funds to pay for the work of models, he turned to self-portraiture, creating about 20 paintings in this genre in two years.

The Parisian period (1886-1888) became one of the artist's most productive creative periods.

In February 1888, Van Gogh went to the south of France to Arles, where he dreamed of creating a creative community of artists.

In December, Vincent's mental health took a turn for the worse. During one of the uncontrollable outbursts of aggression, he threatened with an open razor Paul Gauguin, who came to him in the open air, and then cut off a piece of his earlobe, sending it as a gift to one of the women he knew. After this incident, Van Gogh was placed first in a psychiatric hospital in Arles, and then voluntarily went to the specialized clinic of St. Paul of Mausoleum near Saint-Remy-de-Provence. The head physician of the hospital, Theophile Peyron, diagnosed his patient with "acute manic disorder." However, the artist was given a certain freedom: he could paint outdoors under the supervision of staff.

In Saint-Remy, Vincent alternated periods of intense activity and long breaks caused by deep depression. In just a year of being in the clinic, Van Gogh painted about 150 paintings. Some of the most outstanding canvases of this period were: "Starry Night", "Irises", "Road with Cypresses and a Star", "Olives, Blue Sky and White Cloud", "Pieta".

In September 1889, with the active assistance of Brother Theo, Van Gogh's paintings took part in the Salon des Indépendants, an exhibition of contemporary art organized by the Society of Independent Artists in Paris.

In January 1890, Van Gogh's paintings were exhibited at the eighth exhibition of the Group of Twenty in Brussels, where they were enthusiastically received by critics.

In May 1890, Van Gogh's mental state improved, he left the hospital and settled in the town of Auvers-sur-Oise (Auvers-sur-Oise) in the suburbs of Paris under the supervision of Dr. Paul Gachet.

Vincent actively took up painting, almost every day he finished a painting. During this period, he painted several outstanding portraits of Dr. Gachet and 13-year-old Adeline Rava, the daughter of the owner of the hotel in which he lodged.

On July 27, 1890, Van Gogh left the house at the usual time and went to paint. On his return, after persistent questioning by the Ravos, he confessed that he had shot himself with a pistol. All attempts by Dr. Gachet to save the wounded were in vain, Vincent fell into a coma and died on the night of July 29 at the age of thirty-seven. He was buried in the Auvers cemetery.

American biographers of the artist Stephen Nayfeh and Gregory White Smith in their study "Van Gogh's Life" (Van Gogh: The Life) of Vincent's death, according to which he died not from his own bullet, but from an accidental shot by two drunken young people.

During the ten-year creative activity, Van Gogh managed to write 864 paintings and almost 1200 drawings and engravings. During his lifetime, only one painting by the artist was sold - the landscape "Red Vineyards in Arles". The cost of the painting was 400 francs.

The material was prepared on the basis of information from open sources

Vincent van Gogh, who gave the world his "Sunflowers" and "Starry Night", was one of the greatest artists of all time. A small grave in the French countryside became his final resting place. He fell asleep forever among those landscapes that Van Gogh left on his own - an artist who will never be forgotten. For the sake of art, he sacrificed everything ...

A unique talent gifted by nature

"There is something of a delightful symphony in color." There was a creative genius behind these words. Moreover, he was intelligent and sensitive. The whole depth and style of this man's life is often misunderstood. Van Gogh, whose biography has been carefully studied by many generations, is the most incomprehensible creator in the history of art.

First of all, the reader must understand that Vincent is not only the one who went crazy and shot himself. Many people know that Van Gogh cut off his ear, and someone knows that he painted a whole series of paintings about sunflowers. But there are very few who really understand what talent Vincent possessed, what a unique gift he was awarded by nature.

The sad birth of a great creator

On March 30, 1853, the cry of a newborn child cut through the silence. The long-awaited baby was born in the family of Anna Cornelia and pastor Theodore Van Gogh. It happened a year after the tragic death of their first child, who died within hours of being born. When registering this baby, identical data were indicated, and the long-awaited son was given the name of the lost child - Vincent William.

Thus began the saga of one of the world's most famous artists in the rural wilderness of the south of the Netherlands. His birth was associated with sad events. It was a child conceived after a bitter loss, born to people who were still mourning their dead firstborn.

Vincent's childhood

Every Sunday, this red-haired freckled boy went to church, where he listened to his parent's sermons. His father was a minister of the Dutch Protestant Church, and Vincent van Gogh grew up in accordance with the standards of education adopted in religious families.

In Vincent's time, there was an unspoken rule. The eldest son must follow in the footsteps of his father. This is how it should have happened. This placed a heavy burden on the shoulders of the young Van Gogh. While the boy sat on the pew, listening to his father's sermons, he fully understood what was expected of him. And, of course, then Vincent van Gogh, whose biography had not yet been connected with art in any way, did not know that in the future he would decorate his father's Bible with illustrations.

Between art and religion

The Church occupied an important place in Vincent's life and had a great influence on him. Being a sensitive and impressionable person, throughout his restless life he was torn between religious zeal and a craving for art.

In 1857 his brother Theo was born. None of the boys knew then that Theo would play a big role in Vincent's life. They spent many happy days. We walked for a long time among the surrounding fields and knew all the paths around.

The giftedness of young Vincent

Nature in the rural outback, where Vincent van Gogh was born and raised, would later become a red thread running through all his art. The hard work of the peasants left a deep impression in his soul. He developed a romantic perception of rural life, respected the inhabitants of this area and was proud of their neighborhood. After all, they earned their living by honest and hard work.

Vincent van Gogh was a man who adored everything related to nature. He saw beauty in everything. The boy often drew and did it with such feeling and attention to detail, which are more often characteristic of a more mature age. He demonstrated the skills and craftsmanship of an experienced artist. Vincent was truly gifted.

Communication with mother and her love for art

Vincent's mother, Anna Cornelia, was a good artist and strongly supported her son's love for nature. He often took walks alone, enjoying the peace and tranquility of the endless fields and canals. When twilight was gathering and the fog was falling, Van Gogh returned to a cozy house, where the fire crackled pleasantly and his mother's knitting needles pounded in time with him.

She loved art and carried on an extensive correspondence. Vincent adopted this habit of hers. He wrote letters until the end of his days. Thanks to this, Van Gogh, whose biography began to be studied by specialists after his death, could not only reveal his feelings, but also recreate many events related to his life.

Mother and son spent long hours together. They drew with a pencil and paints, had lengthy conversations about the love of art and nature that united them. Father, meanwhile, was in the office, preparing for the Sunday sermon in the church.

Rural life away from politics

The imposing Zundert administration building was directly opposite their house. Once Vincent drew buildings, looking out of the window of his bedroom, located on the top floor. Later, he more than once depicted the scenes seen from this window. Looking at his talented drawings of that period, one can hardly believe that he was only nine years old.

Contrary to the expectations of his father, a passion for drawing and nature took root in the boy. He had amassed an impressive collection of insects and knew how they were all called in Latin. Very soon, the ivy and moss of the damp dense forest became his friends. In the depths of his soul, he was a true rural boy, explored the Zundert canals, caught tadpoles with a net.

Van Gogh's life took place away from politics, wars and all other events taking place in the world. His world was formed around beautiful colors, interesting, and peaceful landscapes.

Communication with peers or home education?

Unfortunately, his special attitude to nature made him an outcast among other village children. He was not popular. The rest of the boys were mostly the sons of peasants, they loved the turmoil of rural life. Sensitive and sensitive Vincent, who was interested in books and nature, did not fit into their society.

The life of the young Van Gogh was not easy. His parents were worried that other boys would be a bad influence on his behavior. Then, unfortunately, Pastor Theodore found out that Vincent's teacher was too fond of drinking, and then the parents decided that the child should be spared such influence. Until the age of eleven, the boy studied at home, and then his father decided that he needed to get a more serious education.

Further education: boarding school

Young Van Gogh, whose biography, interesting facts and personal life are of interest to a huge number of people today, is sent in 1864 to a boarding school in Zevenbergen. This is a small village, located about twenty-five kilometers from his home. But for Vincent, she was like the other end of the world. The boy was sitting in a wagon next to his parents, and the closer the walls of the boarding school approached, the heavier his heart became. Soon he will part with his family.

Vincent will yearn for his home all his life. Isolation from relatives left a deep imprint on his life. Van Gogh was a smart child and was drawn to knowledge. While studying at a boarding school, he showed great ability for languages, and this later came in handy in his life. Vincent spoke and wrote fluently in French, English, Dutch and German. This is how Van Gogh spent his childhood. A brief biography of a young age could not convey all those character traits that were laid down from childhood and later influenced the fate of the artist.

Education in Tilburg, or an incomprehensible story that happened to a boy

In 1866, the boy was thirteen years old, and elementary education came to an end. Vincent became a very serious young man, in whose eyes one could read boundless longing. He is sent even further away from home, to Tilburg. He begins his studies at a public boarding school. Here Vincent first got acquainted with city life.

Four hours a week were allotted for the study of art, which was a rarity in those days. This subject was taught by Mr. Heismans. He was a successful artist and ahead of his time. As models for the work of his students, he used figurines of people and stuffed animals. The teacher also encouraged in children the desire to paint landscapes and even took the children to nature.

Everything went well and Vincent passed his first year exams with ease. But over the next year, something went wrong. Van Gogh's attitude to study and work has changed dramatically. Therefore, in March 1868, he leaves school right in the middle of the school period and comes home. What did Vincent van Gogh experience at the Tilburg school? A brief biography of this period, unfortunately, does not provide any information about this. And yet, these events left a deep imprint on the soul of the young man.

Choice of life path

There was a long pause in Vincent's life. At home, he spent fifteen long months, not daring to choose one way or another in life. When he turned sixteen, he wanted to find his calling so that he could devote his whole life to it. The days passed in vain, he needed to find a purpose. The parents understood that something needed to be done and turned to the father's brother, who lives in The Hague, for help. He ran an art trading firm and could have gotten Vincent a job. This idea turned out to be brilliant.

If the young man shows diligence, he will become the heir of his rich uncle, who did not have his own children. Vincent, tired of the leisurely life of his native places, is happy to go to The Hague, the administrative center of Holland. In the summer of 1869, Van Gogh, whose biography will now be directly related to art, begins his career.

Vincent became an employee at Goupil. His mentor lived in France and collected works by artists of the Barbizon school. At that time in this country they were fond of landscapes. Van Gogh's uncle dreamed of the appearance of such masters in Holland. He becomes the inspirer of the Hague School. Vincent had the opportunity to meet many artists.

Art is the main thing in life

Having become acquainted with the affairs of the firm, Van Gogh had to learn how to negotiate with clients. And while Vincent was a junior employee, he picked up the clothes of people who came to the gallery, served as a porter. The young man was inspired by the world of art around him. One of the artists of the Barbizon school was his canvas "The Gatherers" resonated in Vincent's soul. It became a kind of icon for the artist until the very end of his life. Millet depicted peasants at work in a special manner that was close to Van Gogh.

In 1870, Vincent met Anton Mauve, who eventually became his close friend. Van Gogh was a taciturn, reserved man, prone to depression. He sincerely sympathized with people who were less fortunate in life than he was. Vincent took his father's preaching very seriously. After a working day, he went to private theology classes.

Another passion of Van Gogh was books. He is fond of French history and poetry, and also becomes a fan of English writers. In March 1871, Vincent turns eighteen. By this time, he had already realized that art was a very important part of his life. His younger brother Theo was fifteen at the time, and he came to Vincent for the holidays. This trip left a deep impression on both of them.

They even made a promise that they would take care of each other for the rest of their lives, no matter what happened. From this period, an active correspondence begins, which is conducted by Theo and Van Gogh. The artist's biography will subsequently be replenished with important facts precisely thanks to these letters. 670 letters of Vincent have survived to this day.

Trip to London. Important stage of life

Vincent spent four years in The Hague. It's time to move on. After saying goodbye to friends and colleagues, he prepared to leave for London. This stage of life will become very important for him. Vincent soon settled in the English capital. The Goupil branch was located in the heart of the business district. Chestnut trees with spreading branches grew in the streets. Van Gogh loved these trees and often mentioned it in his letters to his relatives.

A month later, his knowledge of English expanded. The masters of art intrigued him, he liked Gainsborough and Turner, but he remained true to the art he had come to love in The Hague. To save money, Vincent moves out of the apartment rented for him by the Goupil firm in the market district and rents a room in a new Victorian house.

He enjoyed living with Mrs. Ursula. The owner of the house was a widow. She and her nineteen-year-old daughter Eugenia rented rooms and taught, so that at least somehow. Over time, Vincent began to have very deep feelings for Eugenia, but did not give them away. He could write about this only to his relatives.

Severe psychological shock

Dickens was one of Vincent's idols. He was deeply affected by the death of the writer, and he expressed all his pain in a symbolic drawing made shortly after such a sad event. It was an image of an empty chair. who became very famous, painted a large number of such chairs. For him, it became a symbol of the departure of a person.

Vincent describes the first year in London as one of his happiest. He was in love with absolutely everything and still dreamed of Eugene. She won his heart. Van Gogh tried his best to please her, offering his help in various matters. After some time, Vincent nevertheless confessed his feelings to the girl and announced that they should get married. But Evgenia refused him, as she was already secretly engaged. Van Gogh was devastated. His dream of love was shattered.

He withdrew into himself, spoke little at work and at home. Was eating little. The realities of life dealt Vincent a heavy psychological blow. He begins to paint again, and this partly helps him find peace and distracts him from the heavy thoughts and shock that Van Gogh experienced. Paintings gradually heal the artist's soul. The mind was consumed by creativity. He went to another dimension, which is characteristic of many creative people.

A change of scenery. Paris and homecoming

Vincent became lonely again. He began to pay more attention to the street beggars and ragamuffins inhabiting the slums of London, and this only increased his depression. He wanted to change something. At work, he showed apathy, which began to seriously disturb his management.

It was decided to send him to the Paris branch of the firm, in order to change the situation and, perhaps, dispel the depression. But even there, Van Gogh could not recover from loneliness and already in 1877 returned home to work as a priest in the church, leaving his ambitions to become an artist.

A year later, Van Gogh receives a position as parish priest in a mining village. It was a thankless job. The life of the miners made a great impression on the artist. He decided to share their fate and even began to dress like them. Church officials were concerned about his behavior and two years later he was removed from office. But the time spent in the country had a beneficial effect. Life among the miners awakened in Vincent a special talent, and he began to paint again. He created a huge number of sketches of men and women carrying sacks of coal. Van Gogh finally decided for himself to become an artist. It was from this moment that a new period began in his life.

Regular bouts of depression and returning home

The artist Van Gogh, whose biography repeatedly mentions that his parents refused to supply him with money due to instability in his career, was a beggar. He was helped by his younger brother Theo, who was selling paintings in Paris. Over the next five years, Vincent perfected his technique. Equipped with his brother's money, he goes on a trip to the Netherlands. Makes sketches, paints in oils and watercolors.

Wanting to find his own pictorial style, in 1881 Van Gogh ended up in The Hague. Here he rents an apartment near the sea. This was the beginning of a long relationship between the artist and his environment. During periods of despair and depression, nature was part of Vincent's life. She was for him the personification of the struggle for existence. He had no money, he often went hungry. Parents, who did not approve of the artist's lifestyle, completely turned away from him.

Theo arrives in The Hague and convinces his brother to return home. At the age of thirty, a beggar and full of despair, Van Gogh arrives at his parents' house. There he sets up a small workshop for himself and begins to make sketches of local residents and buildings. During this period, his palette becomes muted. Van Gogh's paintings come out all in gray-brown tones. In winter, people have more time, and the artist uses them as his models.

It was at this time that sketches of the hands of farmers and people picking potatoes appeared in Vincent's work. - Van Gogh's first significant painting, which he painted in 1885, at the age of thirty-two. The most important detail of the work are the hands of people. Strong, accustomed to working in the field, harvesting. The talent of the artist finally broke out.

Impressionism and Van Gogh. Self-portrait photo

In 1886 Vincent comes to Paris. Financially, he also continues to depend on his brother. Here, in the capital of world art, Van Gogh is struck by a new trend - the Impressionists. A new artist is born. He creates a huge number of self-portraits, landscapes and sketches of everyday life. His palette is also changing, but the main changes have affected the technique of writing. Now he draws with broken lines, short strokes and dots.

The cold and gloomy winter of 1887 affected the artist's condition, and he again fell into depression. The time spent in Paris had a huge impact on Vincent, but he felt it was time to get back on the road. He went to the south of France, to the provinces. Here Vincent begins to write like a man possessed. His palette is full of bright colors. Sky blue, bright yellow and orange. As a result, canvases juicy in color appeared, thanks to which the artist became famous.

Van Gogh suffered bouts of severe hallucinations. He felt like he was going crazy. The disease increasingly affected his work. In 1888, Theo persuaded Gauguin, with whom Van Gogh was on very friendly terms, to go visit his brother. Paul lived with Vincent for two exhausting months. They often quarreled, and once Van Gogh even attacked Paul with a blade in his hand. Vincent soon self-mutilated by cutting off his own ear. He was sent to the hospital. It was one of the strongest bouts of insanity.

Soon, on July 29, 1890, Vincent van Gogh died by suicide. He lived a life of poverty, obscurity and isolation, and remained an unrecognized artist. But now he is revered all over the world. Vincent became a legend, and his work influenced subsequent generations of artists.

(Vincent Willem Van Gogh) was born March 30, 1853 in the village of Groot-Zundert in the province of North Brabant in the south of the Netherlands in the family of a Protestant pastor.

Van Gogh "Poppies"

In 1879, Van Gogh obtained a position as lay preacher at Vama, a mining center in the Borinage, in southern Belgium. He then continued his preaching mission in the nearby village of Kem.

In the same period, Van Gogh had a desire to paint.

The Parisian period (1886-1888) became one of the artist's most productive creative periods.

In February 1888, Van Gogh went to the south of France to Arles, where he dreamed of creating a creative community of artists.

In January 1890, Van Gogh's paintings were exhibited at the eighth exhibition of the Group of Twenty in Brussels, where they were enthusiastically received by critics.

In May 1890, Van Gogh's mental state improved, he left the hospital and settled in the town of Auvers-sur-Oise (Auvers-sur-Oise) in the suburbs of Paris under the supervision of Dr. Paul Gachet.

The material was prepared on the basis of information from open sources

Dutch Post-Impressionist painter whose work had a timeless influence on 20th-century painting

Vincent Van Gogh

short biography

Vincent Willem van Gogh(Dutch. Vincent Willem van Gogh; March 30, 1853, Grotto-Zundert, the Netherlands - July 29, 1890, Auvers-sur-Oise, France) is a Dutch post-impressionist artist whose work had a timeless influence on the painting of the 20th century. In a little over ten years, he created more than 2,100 works, including about 860 oil paintings. Among them - portraits, self-portraits, landscapes and still lifes, depicting olive trees, cypresses, fields of wheat and sunflowers. Most critics did not notice van Gogh until his suicide at the age of 37, which was preceded by years of anxiety, poverty and mental breakdown.

Childhood and youth

Born March 30, 1853 in the village of Grot Zundert (Dutch. Groot Zundert) in the province of North Brabant in the south of the Netherlands, not far from the Belgian border. Vincent's father was Theodor van Gogh (born February 8, 1822), a Protestant pastor, and his mother was Anna Cornelia Carbentus, the daughter of a venerable bookbinder and bookseller from The Hague. Vincent was the second of seven children of Theodore and Anna Cornelia. He received his name in honor of his paternal grandfather, who also devoted his whole life to the Protestant church. This name was intended for the first child of Theodore and Anna, who was born a year before Vincent and died on the first day. So Vincent, although he was born the second, became the eldest of the children.

Four years after Vincent's birth, on May 1, 1857, his brother Theodorus van Gogh (Theo) was born. In addition to him, Vincent had a brother Cor (Cornelis Vincent, May 17, 1867) and three sisters - Anna Cornelia (February 17, 1855), Liz (Elizabeth Hubert, May 16, 1859) and Wil (Willemina Jacob, March 16, 1862). Vincent is remembered by the family as a wayward, difficult and boring child with "strange manners", which was the reason for his frequent punishments. According to the governess, there was something strange about him that distinguished him from others: of all the children, Vincent was less pleasant to her, and she did not believe that something worthwhile could come out of him. Outside the family, on the contrary, Vincent showed the opposite side of his character - he was quiet, serious and thoughtful. He hardly played with other children. In the eyes of his fellow villagers, he was a good-natured, friendly, helpful, compassionate, sweet and modest child. When he was 7 years old, he went to a village school, but a year later he was taken away from there, and together with his sister Anna, he studied at home, with a governess. On October 1, 1864, he left for a boarding school in Zevenbergen, located 20 km from his home. Departure from home caused much suffering to Vincent, he could not forget this, even as an adult. On September 15, 1866, he began his studies at another boarding school - Willem II College in Tilburg. Vincent is good at languages - French, English, German. There he received drawing lessons. In March 1868, in the middle of the school year, Vincent suddenly left school and returned to his father's house. This concludes his formal education. He recalled his childhood as follows: “My childhood was dark, cold and empty…”.

Work in a trading company and missionary work

In July 1869, Vincent got a job in the Hague branch of a large art and trading company Goupil & Cie, owned by his uncle Vincent ("Uncle Saint"). There he received the necessary training as a dealer. Initially, the future artist set to work with great zeal, achieved good results, and in June 1873 he was transferred to the London branch of Goupil & Cie. Through daily contact with works of art, Vincent began to understand and appreciate painting. In addition, he visited the city's museums and galleries, admiring the work of Jean-Francois Millet and Jules Breton. At the end of August, Vincent moved to 87 Hackford Road and rented a room in the home of Ursula Leuer and her daughter Eugenia. There is a version that he was in love with Eugenia, although many early biographers mistakenly call her the name of her mother, Ursula. Adding to this decades-old naming confusion, recent research suggests that Vincent was not in love with Eugenia at all, but with a German woman named Caroline Haanebiek. What actually happened remains unknown. The refusal of the beloved shocked and disappointed the future artist; gradually he lost interest in his work and began to turn to the Bible. In 1874, Vincent was transferred to the Paris branch of the firm, but after three months of work he again leaves for London. Things were getting worse for him, and in May 1875 he was again transferred to Paris, where he visited exhibitions at the Salon and the Louvre, and eventually he began to try his hand at painting. Gradually, this occupation began to take more time from him, and Vincent finally lost interest in work, deciding for himself that "art has no worse enemies than art dealers." As a result, at the end of March 1876, he was fired from Goupil & Cie due to poor performance, despite the patronage of relatives who co-owned the company.

In 1876 Vincent returned to England, where he found unpaid work as a boarding school teacher at Ramsgate. At the same time, he has a desire to become a priest, like his father. In July, Vincent moved to another school - in Isleworth (near London), where he worked as a teacher and assistant pastor. On November 4, Vincent delivered his first sermon. His interest in the gospel grew and he got the idea to preach to the poor.

Vincent went home for Christmas and was persuaded by his parents not to return to England. Vincent stayed in the Netherlands and worked for half a year in a bookstore in Dordrecht. This work was not to his liking; he spent much of his time sketching or translating passages from the Bible into German, English, and French. Trying to support Vincent's desire to become a pastor, the family sends him in May 1877 to Amsterdam, where he settled with his uncle, Admiral Jan van Gogh. Here he studied diligently under the guidance of his uncle Johannes Stricker, a respected and recognized theologian, in preparation for passing the university entrance examination for the department of theology. In the end, he became disillusioned with his studies, gave up his studies and left Amsterdam in July 1878. The desire to be useful to ordinary people sent him to the Protestant missionary school of pastor Bokma in Laeken near Brussels, where he completed a three-month sermon course (however, there is a version that he did not complete the full course of study and was expelled because of his sloppy appearance, short temper and frequent fits of rage).

In December 1878, Vincent went for six months as a missionary to the village of Paturazh in Borinage, a poor mining area in southern Belgium, where he launched a tireless activity: he visited the sick, read the Scriptures to the illiterate, preached, taught children, and drew maps of Palestine at night to earn money. Such selflessness endeared him to the local population and members of the Evangelical Society, which resulted in the appointment of a salary of fifty francs to him. After completing a six-month period, van Gogh intended to enter the Gospel School to continue his education, but considered the introduced tuition fees to be a manifestation of discrimination and refused to study. At the same time, Vincent turned to the management of the mines with a petition on behalf of the workers to improve their working conditions. The petition was rejected, and van Gogh himself was removed from his position as a preacher by the Synodal Committee of the Protestant Church of Belgium. This was a serious blow to the emotional and mental state of the artist.

Becoming an artist

Fleeing the depression caused by the events in Paturazh, Van Gogh again turned to painting, seriously thought about his studies, and in 1880, with the support of his brother Theo, he left for Brussels, where he began attending classes at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts. However, a year later, Vincent dropped out and returned to his parents. During this period of his life, he believed that it was not at all necessary for an artist to have talent, the main thing was to work hard and hard, so he continued his studies on his own.

At the same time, van Gogh experienced a new love interest, falling in love with his cousin, the widow Kay Vos-Stricker, who was staying with her son in their house. The woman rejected his feelings, but Vincent continued courtship, which set all his relatives against him. As a result, he was asked to leave. Van Gogh, having experienced a new shock and deciding to forever abandon attempts to arrange his personal life, left for The Hague, where he plunged into painting with renewed vigor and began to take lessons from his distant relative, a representative of the Hague school of painting Anton Mauve. Vincent worked hard, studied the life of the city, especially the poor neighborhoods. Achieving an interesting and surprising color in his works, he sometimes resorted to mixing different writing techniques on one canvas - chalk, pen, sepia, watercolor (“Backyards”, 1882, pen, chalk and brush on paper, Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo; "Roofs. View from van Gogh's workshop", 1882, paper, watercolor, chalk, private collection of J. Renan, Paris). The artist was greatly influenced by Charles Bargue's "Drawing Course". He copied all the lithographs of the manual in 1880/1881, and then again in 1890, but only part of it.

In The Hague, the artist tried to start a family. This time, his chosen one was the pregnant street woman Christine, whom Vincent met right on the street and, driven by sympathy for her situation, offered to move in with him with the children. This act finally quarreled the artist with his friends and relatives, but Vincent himself was happy: he had a model. However, Christine turned out to be a difficult character, and soon van Gogh's family life turned into a nightmare. They separated very soon. The artist could no longer stay in The Hague and headed to the north of the Netherlands, to the province of Drenthe, where he settled in a separate hut, equipped as a workshop, and spent whole days in nature, depicting landscapes. However, he was not very fond of them, not considering himself a landscape painter - many paintings of this period are dedicated to peasants, their daily work and life.

According to their subject matter, van Gogh's early works can be classified as realism, although the manner of execution and technique can only be called realistic with certain significant reservations. One of the many problems caused by the lack of art education that the artist faced was the inability to portray the human figure. In the end, this led to one of the fundamental features of his style - the interpretation of the human figure, devoid of smooth or measured graceful movements, as an integral part of nature, in some ways even becoming like it. This is very clearly seen, for example, in the painting “A Peasant and a Peasant Woman Planting Potatoes” (1885, Kunsthaus, Zurich), where the figures of the peasants are likened to rocks, and the high horizon line seems to press on them, not allowing them to straighten up or at least raise their heads. A similar approach to the topic can be seen in the later painting "Red Vineyards" (1888, Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow). In a series of paintings and studies of the mid-1880s. (“Exit from the Protestant Church in Nuenen” (1884-1885), “Peasant Woman” (1885, Kröller-Muller Museum, Otterlo), “Potato Eaters” (1885, Vincent van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam), “Old Church Tower in Nuenen "(1885), written in a dark pictorial range, marked by a painfully acute perception of human suffering and feelings of depression, the artist recreated the oppressive atmosphere of psychological tension. At the same time, the artist also formed his own understanding of the landscape: an expression of his inner perception of nature through the analogy with man His artistic credo was his own words: "When you draw a tree, interpret it as a figure."

In the autumn of 1885, van Gogh unexpectedly left Drenthe, because a local pastor took up arms against him, forbidding the peasants to pose for the artist and accusing him of immorality. Vincent left for Antwerp, where he again began attending painting classes - this time in a painting class at the Academy of Arts. In the evenings, the artist attended a private school, where he painted nude models. However, already in February 1886, van Gogh left Antwerp for Paris to his brother Theo, who was engaged in the trade in works of art.

The Parisian period of Vincent's life began, which turned out to be very fruitful and rich in events. The artist visited the prestigious private art studio of Fernand Cormon, a teacher famous throughout Europe, studied impressionist painting, Japanese engraving, and synthetic works by Paul Gauguin. During this period, van Gogh's palette became light, the earthy tint of paint disappeared, pure blue, golden yellow, red tones appeared, his characteristic dynamic, as if flowing brushstroke ("Agostina Segatori in the Tambourine Cafe" (1887-1888, Vincent Museum van Gogh, Amsterdam), "Bridge over the Seine" (1887, Vincent van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam), "Papa Tanguy" (1887, Rodin Museum, Paris), "View of Paris from Theo's apartment on Rue Lepic" (1887, Museum Vincent van Gogh, Amsterdam). In the work there were notes of calm and tranquility, caused by the influence of the Impressionists. With some of them - Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Camille Pissarro, Edgar Degas, Paul Gauguin, Emile Bernard - the artist met shortly after his arrival in Paris thanks to These acquaintances had the most beneficial effect on the artist: he found a kindred environment that appreciated him, enthusiastically took part in exhibitions of the Impressionists - in the La Fourche restaurant, the Tambourine cafe, then in the lobby of the Free Theater. However, the public was horrified by van Gogh's paintings, which made him again engage in self-education - to study the theory of color by Eugene Delacroix, the textured painting of Adolphe Monticelli, Japanese color prints and planar oriental art in general. The Parisian period of his life accounts for the largest number of paintings created by the artist - about two hundred and thirty. Among them stand out a series of still lifes and self-portraits, a series of six canvases under the general title "Shoes" (1887, Art Museum, Baltimore), landscapes. The role of a person in Van Gogh's paintings is changing - he is not at all, or he is a staffage. Air, atmosphere and rich color appear in the works, however, the artist conveyed the light-air environment and atmospheric nuances in his own way, dividing the whole without merging the forms and showing the “face” or “figure” of each element of the whole. A striking example of this approach is the painting "The Sea in St. Mary" (1888, State Museum of Fine Arts named after A. S. Pushkin, Moscow). The creative search of the artist led him to the origins of a new artistic style - post-impressionism.

Last years. The heyday of creativity

Despite the creative growth of van Gogh, the public still did not perceive and did not buy his paintings, which was very painfully perceived by Vincent. By mid-February 1888, the artist decided to leave Paris and move to the south of France - to Arles, where he intended to create the "Workshop of the South" - a kind of brotherhood of like-minded artists working for future generations. Van Gogh gave the most important role in the future workshop to Paul Gauguin. Theo supported the undertaking with money, and in the same year Vincent moved to Arles. There, the originality of his creative manner and artistic program were finally determined: “Instead of trying to accurately depict what is before my eyes, I use color more arbitrarily, so as to express myself most fully.” The result of this program was an attempt to develop "a simple technique that, apparently, will not be impressionistic." In addition, Vincent began to synthesize pattern and color in order to more fully convey the very essence of local nature.

Although van Gogh declared a departure from impressionistic methods of depiction, the influence of this style was still very strongly felt in his paintings, especially in the transfer of light and air (“Peach Tree in Blossom”, 1888, Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo) or in the use of large coloristic spots (“Anglois Bridge in Arles”, 1888, Wallraf-Richartz Museum, Cologne). At this time, like the Impressionists, van Gogh created a series of works depicting the same species, however, achieving not the exact transmission of changing lighting effects and conditions, but the maximum intensity of the expression of the life of nature. His brush of this period also includes a number of portraits in which the artist tried out a new art form.

A fiery artistic temperament, a painful impulse towards harmony, beauty and happiness, and, at the same time, a fear of forces hostile to man, are embodied in landscapes shining with sunny colors of the south (“The Yellow House” (1888), “Gauguin’s Armchair” (1888), “Harvest. Valley of La Crau "(1888, Vincent van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam), then in ominous, reminiscent of a nightmare images ("Cafe Terrace at Night" (1888, Kröller-Muller Museum, Otterlo); the dynamics of color and stroke fills with spiritual life and movement not only nature and the people who inhabit it (“Red Vineyards in Arles” (1888, The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow)), but also inanimate objects (“Van Gogh’s Bedroom in Arles” (1888, Museum Vincent van Gogh, Amsterdam)). The artist’s paintings become more dynamic and intense in color (“The Sower”, 1888, E. Buerle Foundation, Zurich), tragic in sound (“Night Cafe”, 1888, Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven van Gogh's bedroom in Arles" (1888, Vincent van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam).

On October 25, 1888, Paul Gauguin arrived in Arles to discuss the idea of creating a southern painting workshop. However, a peaceful discussion very quickly turned into conflicts and quarrels: Gauguin was dissatisfied with the carelessness of van Gogh, while van Gogh himself was perplexed that Gauguin did not want to understand the very idea of a single collective direction of painting in the name of the future. In the end, Gauguin, who was looking for peace in Arles for his work and did not find it, decided to leave. On the evening of December 23, after another quarrel, van Gogh attacked a friend with a razor in his hands. Gauguin accidentally managed to stop Vincent. The whole truth about this quarrel and the circumstances of the attack is still unknown (in particular, there is a version that van Gogh attacked the sleeping Gauguin, and the latter was saved from death only by the fact that he woke up on time), but on the same night Van Gogh cut himself ear lobe. According to the generally accepted version, this was done in a fit of remorse; at the same time, some researchers believe that this was not repentance, but a manifestation of insanity caused by the frequent use of absinthe. The next day, December 24, Vincent was taken to a psychiatric hospital, where the attack recurred with such force that the doctors placed him in the ward for violent patients with a diagnosis of temporal lobe epilepsy. Gauguin hurriedly left Arles without visiting van Gogh in the hospital, having previously informed Theo about what had happened.

During periods of remission, Vincent asked to be released back to the studio in order to continue working, but the inhabitants of Arles wrote a statement to the mayor of the city with a request to isolate the artist from the rest of the inhabitants. Van Gogh was asked to go to the Saint-Paul mental hospital in Saint-Remy-de-Provence, near Arles, where Vincent arrived on May 3, 1889. There he lived for a year, tirelessly working on new paintings. During this time, he created more than one hundred and fifty paintings and about a hundred drawings and watercolors. The main types of canvases during this period of life are still lifes and landscapes, the main differences of which are incredible nervous tension and dynamism (“Starry Night”, 1889, Museum of Modern Art, New York), contrasting contrasting colors and - in some cases - the use of halftones ( Landscape with Olives, 1889, J. G. Whitney Collection, New York; Wheat Field with Cypresses, 1889, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York).

At the end of 1889, he was invited to participate in the Brussels exhibition of the "Group of Twenty", where the artist's work immediately aroused the interest of colleagues and art lovers. However, this no longer pleased van Gogh, just as the first enthusiastic article about the painting "Red Vineyards in Arles" signed by Albert Aurier, which appeared in the January issue of the magazine Mercure de France in 1890, did not please either.

In the spring of 1890, the artist moved to Auvers-sur-Oise, a place near Paris, where he saw his brother and his family for the first time in two years. He still continued to write, but the style of his latest work has changed completely, becoming even more nervous and depressing. The main place in the work was occupied by a whimsically curved contour, as if squeezing one or another object (“Country Road with Cypresses”, 1890, Kröller-Muller Museum, Otterlo; “Street and Stairs in Auvers”, 1890, City Art Museum, St. Louis ; "Landscape at Auvers after the rain", 1890, Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow). The last bright event in Vincent's personal life was an acquaintance with an amateur artist, Dr. Paul Gachet.

On the 20th of July 1890, van Gogh painted his famous painting “Wheatfield with Crows” (Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam), and a week later, on July 27, a tragedy occurred. Going out for a walk with drawing materials, the artist shot himself in the heart area with a revolver bought to scare away flocks of birds while working in the open air, but the bullet went lower. Thanks to this, he independently got to the hotel room where he lived. The innkeeper called a doctor, who examined the wound and informed Theo. The latter arrived the next day and spent all the time with Vincent, until his death 29 hours after being wounded from blood loss (at 1:30 am on July 29, 1890). In October 2011, an alternative version of the artist's death appeared. American art historians Stephen Naifeh and Gregory White Smith have suggested that van Gogh was shot by one of the teenagers who regularly accompanied him in drinking establishments.

According to Theo, the artist's last words were: La tristesse durera toujours("The sadness will last forever") Vincent van Gogh was buried in Auvers-sur-Oise on 30 July. On his last journey, the artist was seen off by his brother and a few friends. After the funeral, Theo set about organizing a posthumous exhibition of Vincent's works, but fell ill with a nervous breakdown and exactly six months later, on January 25, 1891, he died in Holland. After 25 years in 1914, his remains were reburied by a widow next to Vincent's grave.

Heritage

Recognition and sales of paintings

Artist on the way to Tarascon, August 1888, Vincent van Gogh on the road near Montmajour, oil on canvas, 48×44 cm, former museum of Magdeburg; the painting is believed to have perished in a fire during World War II

It is a common misconception that only one of his paintings, The Red Vineyards at Arles, was sold during van Gogh's lifetime. This painting was only the first to be sold for a significant amount (at the Brussels exhibition of the Group of Twenty at the end of 1889; the price for the painting was 400 francs). Documents have been preserved on the lifetime sale of 14 works by the artist, starting in 1882 (about which van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo: “The first sheep passed through the bridge”), and in reality there should have been more transactions.

After the first exhibition of paintings in the late 1880s, van Gogh's fame steadily grew among colleagues, art historians, dealers and collectors. After his death memorial exhibitions were organized in Brussels, Paris, The Hague and Antwerp. At the beginning of the 20th century there were retrospectives in Paris (1901 and 1905) and Amsterdam (1905) and significant group exhibitions in Cologne (1912), New York (1913) and Berlin (1914). This had a noticeable impact on subsequent generations of artists. By the middle of the 20th century, Vincent van Gogh is regarded as one of the greatest and most recognizable artists in history. In 2007, a group of Dutch historians compiled " The Canon of Dutch History" for teaching in schools, in which van Gogh was placed as one of the fifty themes, along with other national symbols such as Rembrandt and the art group Style.

Along with the creations of Pablo Picasso, van Gogh's works are among the first on the list of the most expensive paintings ever sold in the world, according to estimates from auctions and private sales. Sold for more than 100 million (2011 equivalent) include: "Portrait of Dr. Gachet", "Portrait of the Postman Joseph Roulin" and "Irises". Wheat Field with Cypresses was sold in 1993 for $57 million, an unbelievably high price at the time, and his Self-Portrait with Ear and Pipe Cut Off was sold privately in the late 1990s. The sale price was estimated at $80-90 million. Van Gogh's "Portrait of Dr. Gachet" was sold at auction for $82.5 million. Plowed Field and Ploughman went on sale at Christie's New York auction house for $81.3 million.

Influence

In his last letter to Theo, Vincent admitted that since he had no children, he viewed his paintings as offspring. Reflecting on this, the historian Simon Schama concluded that he "did have a child - expressionism, and many, many heirs." Schama mentions a wide range of artists who adapted elements of van Gogh's style, including Willem de Kooning, Howard Hodgkin and Jackson Pollock. The Fauvists expanded the scope and freedom of color, as did the German Expressionists of the Die Brücke group and other early modernists. The abstract expressionism of the 1940s and 1950s is seen as partly inspired by van Gogh's broad, gestural brushstrokes. Here's what art historian Sue Hubbard has to say about the exhibition "Vincent van Gogh and Expressionism":

At the beginning of the twentieth century, van Gogh gave the expressionists a new pictorial language that allowed them to go beyond superficial vision and penetrate deeper into the essence of truth. It is no coincidence that at that very moment Freud was also discovering the depths of an essentially modern concept - the subconscious. This beautiful intellectual exhibition gives Van Gogh his rightful place as a pioneer of Art Nouveau.

original text(English)
At the beginning of the twentieth century Van Gogh gave the Expressionists a new painterly language which enabled them to go beyond surface appearance and penetrate deeper essential truths. It is no coincidence that at this very moment Freud was also 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.
Hubbard, Sue. Vincent Van Gogh and Expressionism. Independent, 2007

In 1957, the Irish artist Francis Bacon (1909-1992) based on a reproduction of a painting by van Gogh "The Artist on the Way to Tarascon", the original of which was destroyed during the Second World War, wrote a series of his works. Bacon was inspired not only by the image itself, which he described as "obtrusive", but also by Van Gogh himself, whom Bacon regarded as an "alienated superfluous man" - a position that resonated with Bacon's mood.

Subsequently, the Irish artist identified himself with Van Gogh's theories in art and quoted lines from van Gogh's letter to his brother Theo: "real artists do not paint things as they are ... They paint them because they themselves feel they are."

From October 2009 to January 2010, the Vincent van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam hosted an exhibition dedicated to the artist's letters, then, from the end of January to April 2010, the exhibition moved to the Royal Academy of Arts in London.

Gallery

self-portraits

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Dedicated to Gauguin