Vincent Willem van Gogh

1. Vincent van Gogh misunderstood genius

2. Vincent Willem van Gogh

30 March 1853 – 29 July 1890

3. Early years

• Van Gogh was born to
religious upper middle
class parents. 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.
Vincent c. 1866, age 13

4. Early years

• His brother Theo was born on 1 May 1857. He
had another brother, Cor, and three sisters:
Elisabeth, Anna, and Willemina "Wil".
• Vincent's interest in art began at an early age.
His early drawings are well-done and
expressive
• In a 1883 letter to Theo he wrote, "My youth
was gloomy and cold and sterile."

5. Etten, Drenthe and The Hague

• Van Gogh's parents moved to the Etten
countryside in April 1881. He continued to
draw, often using his neighbours as subjects.
• He went on long walks with his recently
widowed cousin, Kee Vos-Stricker, daughter of
his mother's older sister and Johannes Stricker.
Kee was seven years older and had an eightyear-old son. He proposed marriage but was
refused with the words "No, nay, never"

6. Kee Vos Stricker with her son Jan

7. Kee Vos Stricker

• Kee would not meet him, her parents wrote that his
"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." He did not recall the event well, but
later assumed that his uncle blew out the flame.
Keen's father made it clear to him that Kee's refusal
should be heeded and that the two would not be
marriedbecause of Van Gogh's inability to support
himself.

8. Etten, Drenthe and The Hague

• He settled in The Hague in January 1882, where he
visited his cousin-in-law, Anton Mauve. Mauve
introduced him to painting in oil and watercolour and
lent money to set up a studio, but they fell out, possibly
over the viability of drawing from plaster casts. Van
Gogh's uncle Cornelis, an art dealer, commissioned 12
ink drawings of views of the city which Van Gogh
completed soon after arriving there, along with seven
other drawings that May. In June he suffered a bout of
gonorrhoea and spent three weeks in hospital, then
began to paint in oil.

9. Emerging artist

• In Nuenen, Van Gogh devoted himself to painting and
drawing, and gave money to boys to gather birds' nests for
subject matter. He completed several sketches and paintings
of weavers and their cottages. In late 1884, Margot
Begemann, a neighbour'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. On 26
March 1885, his father died of a heart attack.

10. Emerging artist

• For the first time there was interest from Paris in
his work. In May he completed what is generally
considered his first major work, The Potato
Eaters, the culmination of several years work
painting peasant character studies. In August his
work was first exhibited in the windows of the
paint dealer Leurs in The Hague. After one of
his young peasant sitters became pregnant that
September, Van Gogh was accused of forcing
himself upon her and the village priest forbade
parishioners from modelling for him.

11. The Potato Eaters, 1885

12. Paris (1886–88)

13. Paris

Van Gogh travelled to Paris in March 1886, where he shared Theo's Rue
Laval apartment in Montmartre, to study at Fernand Cormon's studio. In
June, they took a larger flat at 54 Rue Lepic. Because they had no need to
write letters to communicate, little is known about this stay in Paris. [ In
Paris, he painted portraits of friends and acquaintances, still-life paintings,
views of Le Moulin de la Galette, scenes in Montmartre, Asnières, and
along the Seine. During his stay, he collected more Japanese ukiyoe woodblock prints; he also became interested in Japonaiserie when, in
1885 in Antwerp, he used them to decorate the walls of his studio. He
collected hundreds of prints, examples of which are visible in the
backgrounds of several of his paintings; several can be seen hanging on
the wall of his 1887 Portrait of Père Tanguy. In The Courtesan or Oiran
(after Kesai Eisen) (1887), Van Gogh traced the figure from a reproduction
on the cover of the magazine Paris Illustre, which he then graphically
enlarged in the painting

14. Artistic breakthrough and final years Move to Arles (1888–89)

• Van Gogh was enchanted by the local landscape and
light and his works from this period are richly
draped in yellow, ultramarine, and mauve. He made
several excursions into nature during his time there.
His paintings include harvests, wheat fields, and
general rural landmarks from the area, including
The Old Mill (1888), a picturesque structure
bordering the wheat fields.This was one of seven
canvases sent to Pont-Aven on 4 October 1888

15. Gauguin's visit

• When Gauguin wish to visit Arles, Van Gogh
hoped for friendship, and the realisation 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.[84]
• 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. On 17 September he spent
the first night in the still sparsely furnished
Yellow House When Gauguin consented to work
and live in Arles with him, Van Gogh started to
work on The Décoration for the Yellow
House, probably the most ambitious effort he
ever undertook.] Van Gogh completed two chair
paintings: Van Gogh's Chair and Gauguin's Chair
Paul Gauguin, The Painter of Sunflowers:
Portrait of Vincent van Gogh

16. The hospital in Saint-Remy

• Residents expressed
dissatisfaction with the behavior
of Van Gogh, the neighbor
children threw stones at him and
called him a fool. Petition of its
location in the hospital gathered
81 signatures. Aware of his
condition, van Gogh had agreed
to go to the hospital for the
mentally ill. In Saint-Paul
Hospital in Saint-Rémy-deProvence, he arrived on 8 May.
He was diagnosed with "epilepsy
• In mid-June he created one
of the most famous of his
masterpieces - "Starry
Night." Van Gogh lived in
Saint-Remy one year, living
in one room and another in
equipping the studio. During
this time he wrote about
140 paintings, and by his
own admission was feeling
better, "Here I feel happier
at work than on the street."

17. The Starry Night

18. The hospital in Saint-Remy

• December 20, 1889 Van Gogh out of the hospital, two
days to go to Arles. December 23, exactly one year
after cutting off the ear lobe, it dumps the attack of
the disease, even worse than the previous. The attack
lasted about a week, Van Gogh tried to poison their
own colors. When the artist was better, he again
began to draw. Now he is pursuing a new idea - to go,
finally leave this damn place, away from Arlem. He
wrote to his brother: "My visit to give in disaster."
May 16, 1890 he sits in a train heading to Paris.

19. Impressionist Exhibition

• Art Van Gogh "Irises" and
"Starry Night" were met with
approval in autumn salon in
Paris, and ten paintings were
selected after Claude Monet,
Vincent announced the best of
the entire exhibition. Some
paintings were taken to the
exhibition "Les Vingt" in
Brussels, and even sold for 400
francs, thanks to very favorable
reviews from critics Albert
Orye.

20. After returning to Paris

• June 8th greet his brother Theo arrived
with his wife and child, and Vincent
spent a wonderful day in the family. A
month later, Van Gogh had decided to
go for a few days to Theo in Paris. There
was an altercation between the
brothers about money and the
conditions in which Theo kept the
paintings of Vincent in Paris. Vincent
felt that become a burden to his
brother, whose finances deteriorated
and returned the same day to
Overeem-sur-Oise. In a letter to Theo,
Vincent wrote: "I risked their lives to
their work, and it is worth half of me
my sense
The Church at Auvers, 1890, Musée d'Orsay,
Paris

21. Death

• Evening of July 27, 1890 Van Gogh left the house with his
easel and paints and went to the wheat field. There he
got loaned someone familiar with a revolver and shot
himself in the chest. Seriously wounded, he returned to
the hotel, where he found Dr. Gachet and local therapist.
Gachet sent a message to his brother Vincent and Theo
arrived the next day. The last moments of life Vincent
clutched the hand of his brother, who had heard the last
words of Van Gogh: "I would like to die like this." Vincent
began the night in an epileptic attack. Night at 1:30 July
29, 1890 Vincent van Gogh died.

22. Heritage artist

• Over the last 10 years of his life, Vincent van
Gogh managed to create around 800 paintings
and 900 graphic works.