Vincent Van Gogh - Artist Profile
Vincent Van Gogh is the greatest painter of the Post-Impressionism era and one of the most important figures in art history. In the auction business, Vincent Van Gogh is the magical name that has every collector trembling at the knees. Although a prolific artist, Vincent Van Gogh is most often remembered for his Sunflower and Irises paintings. Although Vincent Van Gogh is a world-famous artist today, he did not receive much recognition during his lifetime. Everyone familiar with the story of Vincent Van Gogh is well-aware of the artist's mutilation of his left ear but very few know much more about his history. In this article we will dig just a little deeper into his world, influences and more.
Before the Artist
Van Gogh had many influences on his life including his family and friends, other artists, and his ill health in later life. A servant who worked for the Van Gogh family when Vincent was a child described him as an, "odd, aloof child who had queer manners and seemed more like an old man," than the child he was. This personal account gives us a major clue that Vincent Van Gogh was a unique character, even from an early age. From the viewpoint of children in the neighborhood, Vincent Van Gogh was a curious sight indeed. As a man, unaware of his own artistic genius, Vincent Van Gogh first tried to learn the art of selling the works of other artists. Following his failure as an art dealer, Vincent Van Gogh later wrote to his sister Wilhelmina Van Gogh that the art galleries and art firms "are in the clutches of fellows who intercept all the money," and that only "one-tenth of all the business that is transacted is really done out of belief in art.
The Artist Emerges
In 1880, Vincent moved to Brussels and decided to become an artist. As a post impressionist painter and one of the most famous artists of all time, Vincent Van Gogh has become an icon. As often with an artist of his caliber, Van Gogh's art wasn't understood nor appreciated in his days. Eventually, Vincent was deemed a disappointment to his mother, and eventually to his entire family, even his beloved brother Theo Van Gogh who supported him financially for the 10 years that he worked as a painter. While many emphasize the madness, Vincent had a had a deep rooted passion to show through his art the struggle for beauty and the unending desire of the artist to capture all that he loves. Van Gogh held a great deal of respect for the forces of nature and includes turbulent skies in a number of his works because the subject is so powerful and so full of artistic potential in the face of an empty canvas. Even in his later years when his illness grew, he produced some of his most famous works.
The Illness
His use of absinthe, an alcoholic beverage with convulsant properties favored by French artists of the time, appears to have played a crucial role in rise of Van Gogh’s illness. During this period he would now create perhaps the most intense paintings ever produced. Yet in Arles his illness evolved and grew to psychotic dimensions for the first time before the end of 1888. The major illness of his last 2 years developed in the presence of seizures, and its nature has remained controversial. At the height of his illness, Van Gogh became hallucinatory, paranoid, and delusional, all known to occur in psychosis due to epilepsy. He had recovered from his severe illness and was discharged from the asylum, with the support from his brother. Vincent depended on his brother so heavily for everything during this period, his career as an artist, had become seriously threatened.
Vincent Van Gogh the Legacy
Even in this short article we have learned a few pieces of a much larger puzzle that was the troubled and tortured artist, Vincent Van Gogh. Vincent is known for his chaotic paintings and similarly tumultuous state of mind. He is also famous for selling only one painting in his own lifetime and for slicing off part of his own ear in a fit of madness. Ironically, It is ironic that with all of this, he is deemed by society to be one of our greatest and most successful artists of all time.
Sean Donahoe is the CEO and founder of ArteBlanche.com, one of the internet's leading art suppliers, which he runs with his wife Tamara. Arteblanche.com has a massive inventory of high-quality art poster prints, fine jacquard weave tapestries and highly-collectible and officially-licensed magazine covers from Rolling Stone Magazine, Time Magazine and Life Magazine, as well as many older and vintage magazines. From the most popular art and artists to the hard-to-find items, ArteBlanche has it all and it’s ready for you now. Click here to find the art for your walls now!
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