Vincent Van Gogh was a Brilliant Artist

Vincent van Gogh was a very busy artist! Starting at just 27 he produced nearly 900 paintings and more than 1,100 peices on paper. Vincent was born March 30th, 1853 in Zundert, Netherland and died July 29, 1890 in Auvers-sur-Oise, France. He was only 37. He is known as a Dutch post-impressionist painter. Although Van Gogh was known as the "Mad Artist" in his days, he is one of the most famous and influential people in Western art.

Vincent always enjoyed drawing as a child but once he started drawing for real, he found it so interesting that he could draw for hours. In fact, he was largely self taught. His techniques have become one of the most expressive artwork that contributed to the foundations of modern art. While in Paris, Van Gogh saw the work of the Impressionists personally and also got to see the latest breakthroughs by the Neo-Impressionists. These are mentioned in our book. He started to work with the splintered brushstrokes of the Impressionists and the pointillist touch of the Neo-Impressionists. This helped shape his bolder style. In the spring of 1888, his palette became colorful and his techniques were his own. This was around the time he painted his self portrait, oil painting.

Although Vincent had great pieces of art, he started to struggle mentally. While creating his most famous art paintings of all time, Vincent Van Gogh was fighting a terrible mental illness. These included depression, anxiety and some even say bipolar disorder. There is information saying Van Gogh cut off his own ear but recently two historians claimed that he lost his ear in a fight with his friend, the French artist Gauguin. Van Gogh new he needed help and even entered himself to the realm of doctors and asylums.

Vincent left the mental hospital in Saint-R©my in May 1890 and went to Auvers-sur-Oise. This place offered Vincent the peace and quiet he needed for his mental health. It was also close enough to Paris for him to visit his brother, Theo. His brother was very important to him. During this time Vincent focussed and put all he had into his paintings, completing a work a day. His health seemed to be improving, too. There are many of his letters you can read at the Van Gogh Museum. These letters showed his mental health state through his words. Although he was starting to get better, his illness and uncertainty about his future became too much for him to take. Vincent Van Gogh shot himself in the chest with a pistol. He did not die right away but did end up dying because of this self inflicted wound. He was buried at Auvers on July 30, 1890.

After Vincent's death, Theo inherited all of his paintings and organized them and set them out for people to see. Shortly after this set up, he left Boussod and promptly suffered a nervous breakdown. Vincents art was then passed on to Theo's, Vincent's brother, widowed wife. Where his art went from there is history. Vincent Van Gogh became famous for his meaningful and touchy use of striking color and brisk application of the paint. Van Gogh showed Expressionism, Fauvism, and abstraction in his work with his contoured forms and definite brush work. Van Gogh worked with a sense of importance requiring swift action. This is a huge reason why he was stressful and in a rough mental state majority of his short life.

His whole life, Vincent Van Gogh remained poor and virtually unknown. In fact, he only sold one painting during his lifetime. It was after his death that he became famous for his artwork. His art started to gain interest from other people. Out of his 800 paintings that survived all these years, 100 of them could sell for around $50 million to $100 million right now. To see Some of his paintings today you can visit the Kröller-Müller Museum.You can see The Caf© Terrace on the Place du Forum, Arles, at Night as well as some other pieces by Van Gogh. If you want to see his most famous painting, The Starry Night you can go to the Museum of Modern Art in New York. This would be very interesting to see. Vincent Van Gogh actually created The starry Night while in a mental asylum. In fact a lot of his most famous paintings he created while there.

Vincent Van Gogh was a great post-impressionist painter of Dutch origins. He was considered one of the greatest artist in history. One of his greatest paintings is Starry Night. It was created in 1889. It is an oil-on-canvas painting. In the painting there is a moon and stars filled in the night sky. It is 2' 5' x 3' 0' with intensely swirling patterns rolling across like a wave from the ocean. He used short brushstrokes and applied paint very thick to create this. It is considered a landscape painting. Story has it that while Van Gogh was in his room at the mental asylum he painted this from the view he had outside his window. What I notice the most is the bold steeple of the church and the brightly colored circles suppose to represent stars. I love the mysteries of this painting.

Another famous painting of Van Gogh's is Sunflowers. This is a series of paintings that are very well known. It has livley colors and it really shows the natural beauty of the flowers. What I love about these paintings are in one picture how the background is a lighter yellow than the flowers. The only other color in this specific picture is green. I think all of the yellow draws your attention and makes it really pop. These paintings were created in the 1880's.

Another very eye catching painting I would like to mention of Vincent's collection is The yellow house. Vincent van Gogh made this in 1888. This is an oil on canvas painting that is 72 cm x 91.5 cm. There is actually some history to this painting. Van Gogh rented four rooms of the very house in this picture. It is on Place Lamartine in Arles. There are green shutters on a building which is supposedly where he lived. After moving into the house, he made a letter for Theo. In this letter he had a description and a thorough painting of it. In his letter Van Gogh wrote, 'it's tremendous, these yellow houses in the sunlight and then the incomparable freshness of the blue.' The Yellow House(the street) In the picture there is a restaurant and another house. Van Gogh would eat at the restaurant and go to the other house that lays close to the railway bridge.

My overall favorite painting by Vincent Van Gogh is Almond Blossom. It was one of the paintings from a series made in 1888 and 1890. It is an oil paint painting that is 2' 5' x 3' 0'. This painting is a zoomed in picture of a almond blossom tree branch. The branches seem to extend further than the frame and pops out towards you. The background is a gorgeous blue with different brightness in areas. Then there are multiple branches sprouting from on large branch with gorgeous off-white flowers all over it. I love the look of this painting as well as the warm feeling of it. The branches of the almond tree seem to float against the blue background. The dark lines that outline the branches gives the painting shape and profoundness. This is a technique that Van Gogh had learned in Japanese studies.

Vincent Van Gogh was a brilliant artist who made history every time he put his paintbrush to a canvas. His art is breathtaking. He may have had a tuff life, but his art was successful and now makes people very happy to see. His paintings are worth millions individually and he has taught many lessons through his art. I think he is a great influencer of art for all artist. His art will never be forgotten and his story will become more and more clear over the years as researchers will find.

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