Vincent van gogh last paintings. Vincent Van Gogh. Furious Dutchman. Bright colors of Van Gogh

Van Gogh Vincent (Vincent Willem) (1853-1890), Dutch painter.

In 1869-1876. served as a commissioner for art and trading firms in The Hague, Brussels, London and Paris; in 1876 he worked as a teacher in England.

In 1878-1879. was a preacher in the Borinage (Belgium), where he learned the hard life of miners; protecting their interests brought Van Gogh into conflict with church authorities.

In the 80s. 19th century he turns to art, attends the art academy in Brussels (1880-1881) and Antwerp (1885-1886). Van Gogh enthusiastically draws destitute working people - miners of the Borinage, later - peasants, artisans, fishermen, whose life he observed in Holland in 1881-1885.

Already at the age of thirty, Van Gogh decided to devote himself to painting. He created a series of paintings depicting ordinary people and made in dark, gloomy colors ("Peasant Woman", "Potato Eaters", both 1885). In the initial period of creativity, the artist also made a lot of drawings, in which human figures appear, and landscapes (swamps, ponds, trees, winter roads, etc.). They are influenced by the French painter and graphic artist J. F. Millet.

Since 1886, Van Gogh has been living in Paris, where he joins the searches of A. de Toulouse-Lautrec, P. Gauguin, C. Pizarro. Thanks to these first contacts, light colors appear in his palette, light and color begin to play a more important role in the paintings.

Under the influence of J. Seurat's painting, the artist paints for some time with separate strokes of additional colors, but soon moves on to a simple and vivid expression of color. In this, Van Gogh follows the example of E. Bernard and L. Anquetin, drawing inspiration from stained-glass windows, where clear color planes are delimited by lead partitions, as well as from the “surprising clarity” and “confident drawing” of Japanese prints (“Bridge over the Seine”, “Portrait papa Tanga", both 1887).

In February 1888, Van Gogh left for the south of France, for Arles. Here he creates landscapes shining with the joyful, sunny colors of the south (“Harvest”, “Valley of La Crot”, “Fishing Boats in Sainte-Marie”, “Red Vineyards in Arles”, all. 1888, etc.), spiritualizes ordinary objects with his temperament (“Van Gogh's Bedroom in Arles”, 1888), sometimes succumbing to bouts of loneliness and melancholy (“Night Cafe in Arles”, 1888).

In October, Gauguin comes to the artist. Under his short-lived influence, Van Gogh wrote "Dance Hall". The two artists often and violently argue; one such scene ends with Van Gogh mutilating himself in madness by cutting off his ear. Friends disperse.

The color in the works of Van Gogh becomes even brighter, the impressionistic flickering gives way to almost monochrome paintings, in which either endless beaches or wide furrows of fields appear - both color and object form. Van Gogh refers to light that cannot be called simply daylight - it has an undoubted shade of the supernatural, the artist is looking for an ever more truthful expression of the mystery of the human being and stands out from the general flow of impressionism with a painful thirst for spirituality.

The strain of forces and long studies under the sizzling Arlesian sun led to the fact that the last years of Van Gogh's life were complicated by bouts of mental illness. 1889-1890 he spends in a hospital in Arles, then in Saint-Remy and Auvers-sur-Oise, where on July 29, 1890, he commits suicide.

The works of the last two years breathe a dark, heavy mood (“At the gates of eternity”, “Road with cypresses and stars”, “Landscape at Auvers after the rain”, all 1890).

The creative life of the artist did not last long - about ten years, but during this time about 2200 works were created.

Vincent van Gogh is a famous artist and a scandalous figure in the art world of the 19th century. Today, his work continues to be controversial. The ambiguity of the paintings and their fullness of meanings make us take a deeper look at them and at the life of their creator.

Childhood and family

He was born in 1853 in the Netherlands, in the small village of Grot-Zundert. His father was a Protestant pastor, and his mother was from a family of bookbinders. Vincent van Gogh had 2 younger brothers and 3 sisters. It is known that at home he was often punished for his wayward character and temper.

The men in the artist's family worked in the church or sold paintings and books. From childhood, he was immersed in 2 contradictory worlds - the world of faith and the world of art.

Education

At the age of 7, the elder Van Gogh began attending a village school. Just a year later, he switched to home schooling, and after another 3 he left for a boarding school. In 1866, Vincent became a student at Willem II College. Although the departure and separation from loved ones were not easy for him, he achieved some success in his studies. Here he received drawing lessons. After 2 years, Vincent van Gogh interrupted his basic education and returned home.

In the future, he repeatedly made attempts to get an art education, but none of them was successful.

Searching for yourself

From 1869 to 1876, working as an art dealer for a large firm, he lived in The Hague, Paris and London. During these years, he got to know painting very closely, visited galleries, daily in contact with works of art and their authors, and for the first time tried himself as an artist.

After his dismissal, he worked in 2 English schools as a teacher and assistant pastor. Then he returned to the Netherlands and sold books. But most of the time he spent on drawings and translating fragments of the Bible into foreign languages.

Six months later, having settled in Amsterdam with his uncle Jan van Gogh, he was preparing to enter the university in the department of theology. However, he quickly changed his mind and went first to the Protestant missionary school near Brussels, and then to the mining village of Paturazh in Belgium.

Since the mid 80s of the XIX century. and until the end of his life, Vincent van Gogh actively painted and even sold some paintings.

Some time in 1888 he spent in a psychiatric hospital with a diagnosis of epilepsy of the temporal lobes. The incident with cutting off the earlobe, because of which he ended up in the hospital, is well known - Van Gogh, after a quarrel with Gauguin, separated it from his left ear and took it to a familiar prostitute.

The artist died in 1890 from a bullet wound. According to some versions, the shot was fired by him.

Van Gogh short biography.

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 of the events associated with 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 countryside 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 (Dutch. Vincent Willem van Gogh). Born March 30, 1853 in Grot-Zundert near Breda (Netherlands) - died July 29, 1890 in Auvers-sur-Oise (France). Dutch post-impressionist painter.

Vincent van Gogh was born on 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 respected 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 was remembered by his 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 like this: "My childhood was gloomy, cold and empty ...".

In July 1869, Vincent got a job at the Hague branch of the 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 Eugenie 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 van Gogh visited exhibitions at the Salon and the Louvre, and eventually began to try his hand at painting himself. 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, preparing to pass the entrance exam to the university in 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 Pastor Bokma's Protestant Missionary School 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 a six-month internship, Van Gogh intended to enroll in an evangelical 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 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.

Fleeing from 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 Kea 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).

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 theme 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, treat it like a figure."

In the autumn of 1885, van Gogh unexpectedly left Drenthe due to the fact that 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 the famous throughout Europe teacher Fernand Cormon, studied impressionist painting, Japanese engraving, and synthetic works of Paul Gauguin. During this period, Van Gogh's palette became light, the earthy shade 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, Museum Vincent 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 of Vincent van Gogh, Amsterdam.) In the work there were notes of calm and peace, 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 his brother. These acquaintances had the most beneficial effect on the artist: he found a kindred environment that appreciated him, enthusiastically took part in impressionist exhibitions - 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 forced him to engage in self-education again - 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.

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 in front of 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 states, but the maximum intensity of the expression of the life of nature. His pen 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 the landscapes shining with sunny colors of the south ("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 the artist cut off his lobe ear. 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 remorse, 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 insane asylum of 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, National Gallery, London).

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 clamping one or another object with itself (“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 for a walk with drawing materials, the artist shot himself in the heart area from 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 ("Sorrow will last forever"). Vincent van Gogh was buried at 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.

Vincent Willem van Gogh is a Dutch artist who laid the foundations of the Post-Impressionist movement and largely determined the principles of the work of modern masters.

Van Gogh was born on March 30, 1853 in the village of Groot Zundert in the province of North Brabant (Noord-Brabant), bordering Belgium.

Father Theodore Van Gogh is a Protestant clergyman. Mother Anna Cornelia Carbentus (Anna Cornelia Carbentus) - from a family of respected bookseller and bookbinding specialist from the city (Den Haag).

Vincent was the 2nd child, but his brother died immediately after birth, so the boy was the eldest, and after him five more children were born in the family:

• Theodorus (Theo) (Theodorus, Theo);
• Cornelis (Cor) (Cornelis, Cor);
• Anna Cornelia (Anna Cornelia);
• Elizabeth (Liz) (Elizabeth, Liz);
• Willemina (Vil) (Willamina, Vil).

They named the baby in honor of his grandfather, a minister of Protestantism. This name was supposed to be given to the first child, but due to his early death, Vincent got it.

Memories of relatives paint Vincent's character as very strange, capricious and wayward, naughty and capable of unexpected antics. Outside the home and family, he was brought up, quiet, polite, modest, kind, distinguished by a striking intelligent look and a heart full of sympathy. However, he avoided peers and did not join their games and fun.

At the age of 7, his father and mother enrolled him in school, but a year later he and his sister Anna were transferred to home schooling, and a governess took care of the children.

At the age of 11, in 1864, Vincent was assigned to a school in Zevenbergen. Although it was only 20 km from his native place, the child could hardly bear the separation, and these experiences were remembered forever.

In 1866, Vincent was determined as a student at the educational institution of Willem II in Tilburg (College Willem II in Tilburg). The teenager made great strides in mastering foreign languages, spoke and read French, English, and German perfectly. Teachers also noted Vincent's ability to draw. However, in 1868 he abruptly dropped out of school and returned home. He was no longer sent to educational institutions, he continued to receive education at home. The famous artist's memories of the beginning of his life were sad, childhood was associated with darkness, cold and emptiness.

Business

In 1869, in The Hague, Vincent was hired by his uncle, who bore the same name, whom the future artist called "Uncle Saint". Uncle was the owner of a branch of the Goupil & Cie company, which was engaged in the examination, evaluation and sale of art objects. Vincent acquires the profession of a dealer and makes significant progress, so in 1873 he was sent to work in London.

Working with works of art was very interesting to Vincent, he learned to understand the fine arts, became a regular visitor to museums and exhibition halls. His favorite authors were Jean-François Millet and Jules Breton.

The story of Vincent's first love dates back to the same period. But the story was not clear and confusing: he lived in a rented apartment with Ursula Loyer (Ursula Loyer) and her daughter Eugene (Eugene); biographers argue about who was the subject of love: one of them or Carolina Haanebik (Carolina Haanebeek). But whoever the beloved was, Vincent was refused and lost interest in life, work, art. He begins to read the Bible thoughtfully. During this period, in 1874, he had to transfer to the Paris branch of the company. There he again becomes a frequenter of museums and is fond of creating drawings. Hating the activity of the dealer, he ceases to bring income to the company, and he is fired in 1876.

Teaching and religion

In March 1876, Vincent moved to Great Britain, and entered a free-of-charge teacher at a school in Ramsgate. At the same time, he is thinking about a career as a clergyman. In July 1876, he moved to a school in Isleworth, where he additionally assisted the priest. In November 1876, Vincent reads a sermon and is convinced of the mission to carry the truth of religious teaching.

In 1876, Vincent arrives at his home for the Christmas holidays, and his mother and father begged him not to leave. Vincent got a job in a bookstore in Dordrecht, but he does not like the trade, all the time he devotes to translating biblical texts and drawing.

Father and mother, rejoicing in his desire for religious service, send Vincent to Amsterdam (Amsterdam), where, with the help of a relative, Johaness Stricker, he is prepared in theology for admission to the university, and lives with his uncle, Jan Van Gogh. Gogh), who had the rank of admiral.

After enrolling, Van Gogh was a theology student until July 1878, after which, disappointed, he refuses further studies and flees from Amsterdam.

The next stage of the search was associated with the Protestant missionary school in the city of Laken (Laken) near Brussels (Brussel). The school was led by Pastor Bokma. Vincent gains experience in composing and delivering sermons for three months, but leaves this place as well. Information from biographers is contradictory: either he quit his job himself, or he was fired because of carelessness in clothes and unbalanced behavior.

In December 1878, Vincent continues his missionary service, but now in the southern region of Belgium, in the village of Paturi. Mining families lived in the village, Van Gogh selflessly worked with children, visited houses and talked about the Bible, cared for the sick. To feed himself, he drew maps of the Holy Land and sold them. Van Gogh showed himself as an ascetic, sincere and tireless, as a result, he was given a small salary from the Evangelical Society. He planned to enter the Gospel School, but the education was paid, and this, according to Van Gogh, is incompatible with true faith, which cannot be associated with money. At the same time, he submits a request to the management of the mines to improve the working conditions of the miners. He was refused, deprived of the right to preach, which shocked him and led to another disappointment.

The first steps

Van Gogh finds calm at the easel, in 1880 he decides to try his hand at the Brussels Royal Academy of Arts. He is supported by his brother Theo, but a year later, training is abandoned again, and the eldest son returns to the parental roof. He is absorbed in self-education, he works tirelessly.

He feels love for his widowed cousin, Kee Vos-Stricker, who raised her son and came to visit the family. Van Gogh is rejected, but persists, and he is kicked out of his father's house. These events shocked the young man, he flees to The Hague, immerses himself in creativity, takes lessons from Anton Mauve, comprehends the laws of fine art, makes copies of lithographic works.

Van Gogh spends a lot of time in neighborhoods inhabited by the poor. The works of this period are sketches of courtyards, roofs, lanes:

• Backyards (De achtertuin) (1882);
• Roofs. View from Van Gogh's Studio" (Dak. Het uitzicht vanuit de Studio van van Gogh) (1882).

An interesting technique that combines watercolors, sepia, ink, chalk, etc.

In The Hague, he chooses a woman of easy virtue named Christine as his wife.(Van Christina), which he picked up right on the panel. Christine moved to Van Gogh with her children, became a model for the artist, but she had a terrible character, and they had to leave. This episode leads to a final break with parents and loved ones.

After breaking up with Christine, Vincent leaves for Drenth, in the countryside. During this period, the artist's landscape works appeared, as well as paintings depicting the life of the peasantry.

Early work

The period of creativity, representing the first works made in Drenthe, is distinguished by realism, but they express the key characteristics of the artist's individual manner. Many critics believe that these features are due to the lack of an elementary art education: Van Gogh did not know the laws of the image of a person, therefore, the characters of the paintings and sketches seem angular, ungraceful, as if emerging from the bosom of nature, like rocks, which are pressed by the vault of heaven:

• "Red Vineyards" (Rode wijngaard) (1888);
• "Peasant Woman" (Boerin) (1885);
• The Potato Eaters (De Aardappeleters) (1885);
• "The Old Church Tower in Nuenen" (De Oude Begraafplaats Toren in Nuenen) (1885) and others.

These works are distinguished by a dark palette of shades that convey the painful atmosphere of the surrounding life, the painful situation of ordinary people, the sympathy, pain and drama of the author.

In 1885, he was forced to leave Drenthe, as he displeased the priest, who considered drawing debauchery and forbade the locals to pose for pictures.

Parisian period

Van Gogh travels to Antwerp, takes lessons at the Academy of Arts and additionally in a private educational institution, where he works hard on the image of the nude.

In 1886, Vincent moved to Paris to Theo, who worked in a dealer office that specialized in transactions for the sale of art objects.

In Paris in 1887/88, Van Gogh takes lessons at a private school, learns the basics of Japanese art, the basics of the impressionistic manner of writing, the work of Paul Gauguin (Pol Gogen). This stage in the creative biography of Wag Gogh is called light, in the works the leitmotif is soft blue, bright yellow, fiery shades, the writing style is light, betraying movement, the “stream” of life:

• “Agostina Segatori in het Café Tamboerijn”;
• "Bridge over the Seine" (Brug over de Seine);
• "Daddy Tanguy" (Papa Tanguy), etc.

Van Gogh admired the Impressionists, met celebrities thanks to his brother Theo:

• Edgar Degas;
• Camille Pissarro;
• Henri Toulouse-Lautrec (Anri Touluz-Lautrec);
• Paul Gauguin;
• Emile Bernard and others.

Van Gogh was among good friends and like-minded people, he was involved in the process of preparing expositions, which were organized in restaurants, bars, theater halls. The audience did not appreciate Van Gogh, they recognized them as terrible, but he plunges into teaching and self-improvement, comprehends the theoretical basis of color technique.

In Paris, Van Gogh created about 230 works: still lifes, portrait and landscape painting, cycles of paintings (for example, the “Shoes” series of 1887) (Schoenen).

It is interesting that the person on the canvas acquires a secondary role, and the main thing is the bright world of nature, its airiness, richness of colors, and their subtlest transitions. Van Gogh opens the newest direction - post-impressionism.

Blossoming and finding your own style

In 1888, Van Gogh, worried about the misunderstanding of the audience, leaves for the southern French city of Arles (Arles). Arles became the city in which Vincent realized the purpose of his work: do not strive to reflect the real visible world, but with the help of color and simple techniques to express your inner "I".

He decides to break with the Impressionists, but the features of their style for many years appear in his works, in the ways of depicting light and air, in the manner of arranging color accents. Typical for impressionist works are series of canvases on which the same landscape, but at different times of the day and under different lighting conditions.

The attractiveness of the style of Van Gogh's heyday is in the contradiction between the desire for a harmonious worldview and the awareness of one's own helplessness in the face of a disharmonious world. Full of light and festive nature, the works of 1888 coexist with gloomy phantasmagoric images:

• "Yellow House" (Gele huis);
• "Gauguin's Armchair" (De stoel van Gauguin);
• "Cafe terrace at night" (Cafe terras bij nacht).

The dynamism, the movement of color, the energy of the master's brush is a reflection of the artist's soul, his tragic searches, impulses to understand the surrounding world of living and non-living things:

• "Red Vineyards in Arles";
• "The Sower" (Zaaier);
• "Night Cafe" (Nachtkoffie).

The artist plans to establish a society that unites young geniuses who will reflect the future of mankind. To open the society, Vincent is helped by Theo's means. Van Gogh assigned the leading role to Paul Gauguin. When Gauguin arrived, they quarreled to the point that Van Gogh almost cut his throat on December 23, 1888. Gauguin managed to escape, and Van Gogh, repentant, cut off part of the lobe of his own ear.

Biographers evaluate this episode differently, many believe that this act was a sign of insanity, provoked by excessive consumption of alcoholic beverages. Van Gogh is sent to a mental hospital, where he is kept under strict conditions in the ward for violent lunatics. Gauguin leaves, Theo takes care of Vincent. After the course of treatment, Vincent dreams of returning to Arles. But the inhabitants of the city protested, and the artist was offered to settle next to the Saint-Paul hospital (Saint-Paul) in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence (Saint-Rémy-de-Provence), near Arles.

Since May 1889, Van Gogh has been living in Saint-Remy, during the year he writes more than 150 large things and about 100 drawings and watercolors, demonstrating mastery of halftones and contrast techniques. Among them, the landscape genre prevails, still lifes that convey mood, contradictions in the author's soul:

• "Starry Night" (Nightlights);
• "Landscape with olive trees" (Landschap met olijfbomen), etc.

In 1889, the fruits of Van Gogh's work were exhibited in Brussels, met with rave reviews from colleagues and critics. But Van Gogh does not feel joy from the recognition that has finally come, he moves to Auvers-sur-Oise, where his brother lives with his family. There he constantly creates, but the oppressed mood and nervous excitement of the author are transmitted to the canvases of 1890, they are distinguished by broken lines, distorted silhouettes of objects and persons:

• "Country road with cypress trees" (Landelijke weg met cipressen);
• "Landschap in Auvers after the rain" (Landschap in Auvers na de regen);
• "Wheat field with crows" (Korenveld met kraaien), etc.

On July 27, 1890, Van Gogh was mortally wounded by a pistol. It is not known whether the shot was planned or accidental, but the artist died a day later. He was buried in the same town, and 6 months later his brother Theo also died of nervous exhaustion, whose grave is located next to Vincent.

For 10 years of creativity, more than 2100 works have appeared, among which about 860 are made in oil. Van Gogh became the founder of expressionism, post-impressionism, his principles formed the basis of fauvism and modernism.

A series of triumphal exhibition events took place posthumously in Paris, Brussels, The Hague, Antwerp. At the beginning of the 20th century, another wave of shows of the works of the famous Dutchman took place in Paris, Cologne (Keulen), New York (New York), Berlin (Berlijn).

Paintings

It is not exactly known how many paintings Van Gogh painted, but art historians and researchers of his work tend to figure about 800. In the last 70 days of his life alone, he painted 70 paintings - one a day! Let's remember the most famous paintings with names and descriptions:

The Potato Eaters appeared in 1885 in Nuenen. The author described the task in a letter to Theo: he sought to show people of hard work who received little remuneration for their work. The hands that cultivate the field receive its gifts.

Red vineyards in Arles

The famous painting dates from 1888. The plot of the picture is not fictional, Vincent tells about it in one of the messages to Theo. On the canvas, the artist conveys the rich colors that struck him: thick red grape leaves, a piercing green sky, a bright purple road washed with rain with golden highlights from the rays of the setting sun. The colors seem to flow one into another, convey the author's anxious mood, his tension, the depth of philosophical reflections about the world. Such a plot will be repeated in the work of Van Gogh, symbolizing life eternally renewed in labor.

night cafe

"Night Café" appeared in Arles and presented the author's thoughts about a man who destroys his own life on his own. The idea of ​​self-destruction and a steady movement towards madness is expressed by the contrast of blood-burgundy and green colors. To try to penetrate the secrets of twilight life, the author worked on the painting at night. The expressionistic style of writing conveys the fullness of passions, anxiety, painfulness of life.

Van Gogh's legacy includes two series of works depicting sunflowers. In the first cycle - flowers laid out on the table, they were painted in the Parisian period in 1887 and soon acquired by Gauguin. The second series appeared in 1888/89 in Arles, on each canvas - sunflower flowers in a vase.

This flower symbolizes love and fidelity, friendship and warmth of human relationships, beneficence and gratitude. The artist expresses the depths of his worldview in sunflowers, associating himself with this sunny flower.

"Starry Night" was created in 1889 in Saint-Remy, it depicts the stars and the moon in dynamics, framed by a boundless sky, eternally existing and rushing in the infinity of the Universe. The cypress trees in the foreground strive to reach the stars, while the village in the valley is static, motionless and devoid of aspirations for the new and the infinite. The expression of color approaches and the use of different types of strokes conveys the multidimensionality of space, its variability and depth.

This famous self-portrait was created in Arles in January 1889. An interesting feature is the dialogue of red-orange and blue-violet colors, against which there is an immersion into the abyss of a distorted human consciousness. Attention attracts the face and eyes, as if looking deep into the personality. Self-portraits are the artist's conversation with himself and with the universe.

Almond Blossoms (Amandelbloesem) are created in Saint-Rémy in 1890. The spring flowering of almond trees is a symbol of renewal, of a born and growing life. The uniqueness of the canvas lies in the fact that the branches hover without a foundation, they are self-sufficient and beautiful.

This portrait was painted in 1890. Bright colors convey the significance of every moment, brush work creates a dynamic image of man and nature, which are inextricably linked. The image of the hero of the picture is painful and nervous: we peer at the image of a sad old man, immersed in his thoughts, as if he had absorbed the painful experience of years.

"Wheat Field with Crows" was created in July 1890 and expresses the feeling of approaching death, the hopeless tragedy of life. The picture is filled with symbolism: the sky before a thunderstorm, approaching black birds, roads leading to the unknown, but inaccessible.

Museum

(Van Gogh Museum) opened in Amsterdam in 1973 and presents not only the most fundamental collection of his creations, but also the work of the Impressionists. This is the first most popular exhibition center in the Netherlands.

Quotes

1. Among the clergy, as among the masters of the brush, despotic academicism reigns, dull and full of prejudice;
2. Thinking about future hardships and hardships, I could not create;
3. Painting is my joy and comfort, giving me the opportunity to escape from life's troubles;