An Anniversary: 7

This week’s anniversary is a rather sad one: on this day in 1890, Vincent van Gogh died. We all know how that went down. In fact, we probably all know lots of facts about Vincent & his miserable demise. You probably know he was self-taught, that today we like to think he’d have been given better medical help. But let’s think about what he actually achieved & glorify that instead.

His accomplishments were not financial, having only sold one painting in his lifetime. You might have known this too. In this way he may be regarded as one of the Ultimate Artists, driven purely by the need to create with no material reward. & he was prolific with it, hardworking & making about 2100 works within ten years.

During his short life, he suffered greatly of course & many people will have opinions about his works. I’d argue that there is something for everyone in his oeuvre. If like me, you like monochromatic images, you’ll find them in his creations. Obviously there are the brightly coloured works & among them are not only flowers, but landscapes, portraits (& self-portraits of course), other still lifes, townscapes, interiors, genre works & animals. If you like sketches, drawings, there are plenty of Vincent’s to admire. & his range of styles, apart from the ones with energetic, dramatic brushwork is impressive. He not only wore his heart on his sleeve in his personal life, but also in his art, drawing direct inspiration from past greats or future stars.

What I hope I’ve done with today’s selection is pick some of the Vincents from off the beaten track. Sure, we may have seen them before, but they’re not the ones that are regularly celebrated. What I think they show is an artist with no hand to guide him properly that developed his gifts himself – because love him or loathe him, this is a gifted man. A man that in constant striving to improve & who worked himself into the ground in service to Art.