Van Gogh

Vincent was born on March 30, 1853, in the village of Groot Zunbert in the Dutch province of North Brabant. His father, Theodorus, was pastor of a small Dutch Reformed Church. Vincent's mother, Anna Cornelia Carbentus, was a similarly mild and uninspired soul. It is common for biographers to dismiss Van Gogh's parents with a wave of the hand. Vincent had two brothers and three sisters. At the age of twelve Vincent was sent to boarding school in the village of Zevenbergen, fifteen miles away. At sixteen he left school. Through the influence of Uncle Cent a place was found for him in the office of Goupil and Cie at The Hague. Goupil's was a conservative house, specializing in well-made reproductions of famous paintings. When he was twenty Vincent was transferred, with a fine recommendation, to the London branch of Goupil's. He found a room in the home of Mrs. Loyer, who with her daughter Ursula, and therefore began the first of his several disastrous encounters with women. He fell in love with the girl, but evidently did not bother to tell her. When Vincent shared his feelings with Ursula, he discovered that the thought of loving him had never entered her head. In 1875 Uncle Cent arranged for him to be transferred to the Paris office in the hope that his spirits might be revived by a change in scene. Here he became increasingly careless in his work. He was given three months notice, and then six years of training as an art dealer came to an end. He was almost twenty-three, unemployed, and had not the slightest idea what he would do next. Vincent decided to return to England, where he found a job as a teacher in a boarding school. After he gave up that job, he took another teaching job at a school in Isleworth. As a young man Vincent Van Gogh's strongest compulsion was to love and help mankind. The son of a minister, he chose quite naturally to take up religion. If he had been successful as an evangelist, as he tried to be for several years, he might have drawn and painted as a hobby but he almost surely would not have become an artist. His evangelical mission was a disaster. If anything he tried too hard. At the age of twenty-five, when he went out to serve the peasants and coal miners of the Borinage, in southern Belgium, his manner was so intense, and his devotion to Christ's teachings so literal, that he antagonized his clerical superiors and probably frightened the people he wanted to help. Although he loved humanity, he could not communicate with individuals and, at twenty-seven, he turned to art to communicate for him. The major reason Van Gogh committed him to being an artist was that through art he could pour out his feelings. If he could not alleviate the hard life of the poor Dutch peasant, at least he could show his compassion in drawing and paintings. Perhaps this was his way to a communion with God. In any case, it was in this crucible that his art was formed. In his short life Van Gogh wrote nearly a thousand letters, often several a day. Most were written to his brother Theo, possibly the one person in the world who understood him. Only to Theo could Van Gogh describe the impressions and feelings that boiled within him. The letters are extraordinary; literary critics have compared them to the works of the great 19th Century Russian masters of confessional writing. But even as he was writing so expressively Van Gogh apparently felt that words were not as distinct as pictures. Having decided at twenty-seven that his mission in life was to become an artist, he established his first studio in the cottage of a Borinage coal miner. He paid the rent with small sums sent by his father and commenced his education in a rage of work. From Paris, Theo forwarded sheaves of prints for him to study and copy, and from The Hague the manager of Goupil's branch office sent textbooks on anatomy and perspective. Theo suggested that Vincent join him in Paris, but Vincent seems to have been reluctant to venture into what was then the centre of the art world. Instead, in the fall of 1880, he went to Brussels and moved into the cheapest hotel he could find. Vincent remained in Brussels during the winter 1880-1881, struggling with his craftsmanship and reporting his progress to Theo. Late in 1883 he decided to make another attempt to live with his parents. At this time Vincent's colours were still dark. The Potato Eaters is ordinarily called Van Gogh's first masterpiece. There are no references to religion in Vincent's remarks about The Potato Eaters. Eight months after his father's death Vincent left Holland, never to return. The benefit of his three-month visit in Antwerp was an increased exposure to colour, or, more accurately, increased thought about it. Van Gogh was soon to be the most intense colourist of his time. He sensed that colour has meaning that transcends mere visual impressions. When Van Gogh arrived in Paris in 1886, he was eager to learn and ready to be stimulated by new experiences. In two years he went through a complete change as a