Read Me First
1886
In a year
filled with significant events, hardly anyone in Paris noticed the arrival of a
ragtag, unknown artist with an unpronounceable name. Today, hardly anyone has an interest in the
four major hurricanes[i], a
volcanic eruption that destroyed the ‘eighth wonder’ of the modern world[ii], or the
murderous Haymarket Riots[iii] while
almost everyone knows and appreciates the art of Vincent van Gogh.
Vincent van
Gogh’s story survives mostly as myth, generated from a few events that occurred
during the last year and a half of his life.
This is surprising because an excellent record of almost twenty years
worth of letters survive, written to his family, friends, and acquaintances[iv]. Not only are they an unprecedented cataloguing
of an artist’s work, we learn of his hopes, his dreams, his
disappointments, his failures. We can determine where he did what, when he
did it, his sense of humour, his affection for his family, and his incredibly
bad love life. From the visit of his
younger brother, Theo, in 1872, to the last unfinished letter when he died, in
1890, we have an uninterrupted, personal account of one of the world’s most
famous artists, with one spectacular exception.
It must be
understood that most of Vincent’s letters were sent to Theo, who supported
Vincent in every way, most notably, with cash.
As such, Vincent considered himself employed by Theo and diligently
reported to Theo all his expenses and described, in detail, all the works he
produced. The one exception to this
amazing record is an almost two year period, 1886 to 1888, when they lived
together in the Montmartre suburb of Paris.
Obviously, as they were living together, there was no need to
communicate with letters. This is
unfortunate for two reasons. We are
denied Vincent’s self-description of discovering his sense of colour, of making
the leap from a moderately talented craftsman to an artistic genius, and he
would have provided us with a fascinating record of the day-to-day activities
of Montmartre, one of the most exotic and entertaining locales that ever
existed.
Before Paris,
Vincent’s paintings are best described as lackluster. His most famous work from that period
portrays a peasant family, almost as caricatures, the colours of bituminous
darkness and tarnished metal.
Afterwards, his bright complementary colours virtually leap from the
canvas with an expressiveness seldom matched.
When Vincent
arrived in Paris, the artistic community was still abuzz over Georges Seurat’s
avant garde, scientific colour theory[v]
utilizing small points of pure color. He
would be unveiling his wall-sized masterpiece, ‘A Sunday Afternoon on the
Island of La Grande Jatte’, at the Eighth Impressionist Exhibition within six
weeks. This painting was so controversial
among the original Impressionists that some of them removed their works in
protest.
The
neighborhood of Montmartre, unlike most of the world at this time, was
exceptionally diverse, inhabited by artists and laborers, prostitutes and
clergy, as well as princes, paupers, and everyone betwixt and between[vi]. The interaction of such a diverse group led
them to be at the forefront of a societal change that was starting to happen
all over the world. To understand, one
only needs to be told about the birth of communism, bombings of anarchists, and
the rapid rise of labor unions[vii]. Wealthy individuals owned the factories,
employed their own police, and made sure politicians did whatever it took to
keep the status quo. The population
required to operate huge sweatshops created vast slums of unprecedented squalor
in most industrialised nations. In 1886,
there were over a thousand strikes in the United States protesting working
conditions[viii]. In the Borinage region of Belgium, Vincent
describes going down seven hundred metres in a mine and seeing young children,
both boys and girls, loading coal into carts for the trip to the surface[ix].
Just as
society was in tremendous upheaval, so was the artistic world. Nowhere was this more evident than in the
area of fine art painting. Throughout
history people paid to have their portrait painted. The artist who could create the most
pleasing, life-like rendition of their patron earned the most money. The same applied to landscapes, religious
icons, battle scenes, flowers, and baskets of fruit. Realism ruled. Or so it was thought.
In the mid
1800s, a new technology was starting to become popular which put all artists to
shame[x]. That technology was photography, and an image
produced by a good camera was incomparable.
For the first time, everyone had the opportunity to see an exact replica
of whatever the camera was pointed at, rather than a somewhat flattering
version of the artist's quasi-reality.
Even more threatening, as new uses for photography were continually
being found, it was constantly in the news.
For example, in the previous year, Louis-Jean Delton became one of the
first to photograph the end of a horse race at Longchamp, Grande Prix de Paris;
one of the early attempts to obtain a ‘photo finish’[xi].
The answer to
this onslaught of technology was conceived by a group of artists who met weekly
at the Café Guerbois in Paris[xii]. The painters were Manet, Bazille, Sisley,
Morisot, Degas, Guillaumin, Pissarro, Monet, Cezanne, and Renoir. What they tried to do was create their own,
unique version of reality[xiii],[xiv].[xv],[xvi],[xvii],[xviii],[xix].
Using style,
composition, colour, choice of subject material, in whatever combination, in
each of his or her own way, they were able to create a more full and emotional
viewing experience than could ever be achieved with a photograph, let alone the
old, rigidly structured paintings of the past.
As logical as it seems today, at the time, it was absolutely
revolutionary and extremely threatening to the existing artistic
community. Traditional artists spent
years learning skills to become good enough to produce paintings on par with
those hanging in the museums and galleries of the day. Art dealers had the benefit of hundreds of
years of history to explain what good art was, and why one painting was worth
five francs and another, fifty thousand.
Opposition to
the new work was dramatic. Not only was
the new style of painting not accepted for exhibition at the annual Salon nor
any of the established galleries, it was ridiculed unmercifully. One cartoon shows a pregnant woman being
forcibly blocked from entering an Impressionist art exhibition for fear of
harming the unborn baby[xx]. This was particularly vexing for Theo van
Gogh. As a gallery manager for one of
the most respected art purveyors in the world, he was expected to keep pushing
the company's product even though he saw the beauty and huge potential of the
new works, not to mention his brother would go on to become one of the most
successful in applying the new philosophy of painting.
Lastly, some
common misconceptions about Vincent need to be corrected as soon as
possible. He did not go mad in the sense
that he gradually lost his mind unable to comprehend reality. In truth, he had epileptic-type seizures,
sporadically, the last year and a half of his life. Many reasons have been
postulated for his condition[xxi]. In the end, it is not important what caused
his malady, only that he did not remember anything that happened during the
episodes, and he was a brilliant artist in spite of his illness, not because of
it.
The famous
incident in which part of his ear was cut off remains a mystery. We do not know if it was self-inflected, or
not. In a letter to Theo about five
months after the incident, Vincent said the doctor who first treated him
mentioned another case where someone had injured his ear during an epileptic
seizure[xxii]. Some think Gauguin was involved as they were
living together, and Gauguin, being an avid fencer, had all his equipment with
him at the time[xxiii]. The fact that Vincent was keeping himself
clean shaven using a straight razor during this period only adds to the
uncertainty. The one thing we know for
certain is the ear incident coincided with the first episode of whatever malady
afflicted him[xxiv].
Another
misconception concerns Vincent’s affairs of the heart. It is true he never had a traditional,
long-term relationship with anyone.
However, he did live with a woman and her children in a family situation
for a year, had a romantic interest in at least three other women, and is
implicated in fathering two children, all before arriving in Paris in 1886[xxv],[xxvi].
The last myth that needs
to be examined concerns Vincent’s reputation for being serious and
difficult. While his best friend, Emile
Bernard, described him as being interminable in explaining and developing
ideas, he also said he was not very ready to argue, with dreams of gigantic
exhibitions and philanthropic communities of artists[xxvii]. Vincent inspired such loyalty that
Toulouse-Lautrec challenged someone to a duel because they made disparaging
remarks about Vincent’s work[xxviii].
When provoked, Vincent
could raise his voice and argue in any one of four different languages[xxix], yet
he was so thoughtful of those who viewed his paintings, knowing the problems
they would have trying to pronounce his last name correctly, he signed his
works, simply, ‘Vincent’[xxx]. Many times when asked to explain his work he
would say, ‘My main goal is to leave the canvas more valuable after I’m through
than it was before I started.’[xxxi] Such was the politeness and self-effacing
humour of Vincent van Gogh.
[i] Atlantic Hurricane Work Group, “1886 Atlantic Hurricanes”,
en.wikipedia.org. Accessed 7 February
2022.
[ii] "Pink and White Terraces on Lake
Rotomahana", New Zealand National Archives, nzhistory.govt.nz. Accessed
7 February 2022.
[iii] Britannica, The Editors
of Encyclopaedia. "Haymarket affair". Encyclopedia
Britannica, 27 Apr. 2021,
https://www.britannica.com/event/Haymarket-Affair. Accessed 4 November 2021.
[iv] Vincent van Gogh. The
Letters.
Ed. Leo Jansen. Hans Luijten and Nienke Bakker. 6
volumes. London 2009 (Thames & Hudson).
[v] Field, D.M., Van Gogh,
pages 140, 142, Edison, New Jersey, 2005
Chartwell Books, Inc.
[vi] “Montmartre”, History, 19th Century, en.m.wikipedia.org.
Accessed 8 February 2022.
[vii] Social and Political Impact
of the First Phase of the Industrial Revolution, encyclopedia.com. Accessed
8 February 2022.
8Taillon,
Paul M., Good, Reliable, White Men: Railroad Brotherhoods 1872-1917, Chicago:
University of Illinois Press, 2009
[ix] Letter 151, Letter to Theo:
Petit-Wasmes, between Tuesday and Wednesday, 16
April 1879, Vincent van Gogh. The
Letters.
Ed. Leo Jansen. Hans Luijten and Nienke Bakker. 6
volumes. London 2009 (Thames & Hudson).
[x] Rosenblum, Naomi ; Grundberg, Andy; Gernsheim, Helmut Erich Robert;
Newhall, Beaumont. "history of photography". Encyclopedia Britannica,
3 Dec. 2020, https://www.britannica.com/technology/photography. Accessed 4
November 2021.
[xi] Baker, Kenneth, Stanford show
captures early photographers trying to freeze a moment. SF Gate
Entertainment. sfgate.com/entertainment/article/Motion-pictures-Stanford-show-captures-early-2651905.php. Accessed 8 February 2022
[xii] “Cafe Guerbois”, en.wikipedia.org.
Accessed 9 February 2022.
[xiii]
Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. "Impressionism". Encyclopedia Britannica, 13
Mar. 2020, https://www.britannica.com/art/Impressionism-art. Accessed 10
February 2022.
[xiv] Loyrette, Henri, Degas,
pages 99-103, 2016, published by The Council of Trustees of the National
Gallery of Victoria 180 St Kilda Road, Melbourne, Victoria 3004, Australia,
ngv.vic.gov.au
[xv] Kinsman, Jane and Guegan, Stephane, Toulouse-Lautrec, Paris &
The Moulin Rouge, pages 54-56, 2012, Produced by the Publishing
Section, National Gallery of Australia. Distributed in Australia by New South
Books, 45 Beach Street, Coogee, NSW, 2034, Australia.
[xvi] Cogeval, Guy, Van Gogh, Gauguin, Cezanne & Beyond,
pages 17-20, 2009, Produced
by NGA Publishing, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, nga.gov.au.
[xvii] Naifeh, Steven and White Smith, Gregory, Van Gogh, The Life, pages 498-502, 2011, Random House, New York,
Profile Books, London.
[xviii] Samu, A. Margaret, Impressionism, Fashion, and Modernity, Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, October 2004
B. Impressionism, Fashion, and Modernity, exhibit at The Met, Fifth
Avenue, New York City, Feb 28- May 27, 2013.
[xix] “William-Adolphe Bouguereau”, en.wikipedia.org, Accessed 10 February 2022.
[xx] “Pictorial. Louis Leroy’s scathing review of the First Exhibition
of the Impressionists”, arthive.com,
Accessed 10 February 2022.
[xxi] Prins, Laura, On the Verge of Insanity, Van Gogh and His Illness,
pages 122-128, 2016, published to accompany the exhibition at Van Gogh Museum,
Amsterdam, Mercatorfords, Brussels, Yale University Press, New Haven and
London.
[xxii] Letter 776, Letter to Theo: Saint Remy de Provence, on or about Thursday, 23
May, 1889. Vincent van Gogh. The Letters. Ed. Leo Jansen.
Hans Luijten and Nienke Bakker. 6 volumes.
London 2009 (Thames & Hudson).
[xxiii] Letter 734, Paul Gauguin to Vincent: Paris, between Tuesday 8 and Wednesday 16
January, 1889. And bibliography 10. Vincent van
Gogh. The Letters. Ed. Leo Jansen. Hans Luijten and Nienke Bakker. 6
volumes. London 2009 (Thames & Hudson).
[xxiv] Letters 734, 736, 737, 739, 765, 767, Tuesday 6 January to Thursday
2 May, 1889. Vincent van Gogh. The
Letters.
Ed. Leo Jansen. Hans Luijten and Nienke Bakker. 6
volumes. London 2009 (Thames & Hudson).
[xxv] Naifeh,
Steven and White Smith, Gregory, Van
Gogh, The Life, pages 400-404, 2011, Random House, New York, Profile Books,
London.
[xxvi] Naifeh, Steven and White Smith, Gregory, Van Gogh, The Life, pages 455, 466, 2011, Random House, New York,
Profile Books, London.
[xxvii] Field, D.M., Van Gogh,
page 172, Edison, New Jersey, 2005
Chartwell Books, Inc.
[xxviii] “Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec”, en.wikipedia.org, Accessed 11 February 2022.
[xxix] Vincent van Gogh. The Letters. Ed. Leo
Jansen. Hans Luijten and Nienke Bakker. 6 volumes.
London 2009 (Thames & Hudson).
[xxx] “Van Go? Van Gof? Van Gog? They’re all wrong, Van Gogh experts
say”, edition.cnn.com, Accessed 12 February 2022.
[xxxi] Letter 645, To Theo: Arles, on or about Sunday, 22
July, 1888 and bibliography 10. Vincent van Gogh. The Letters. Ed. Leo
Jansen. Hans Luijten and Nienke Bakker. 6 volumes.
London 2009 (Thames & Hudson).