visiting art

Categories: uncategorized

Date: 19 March 2004 19:27:58

weekend in amsterdam recently included popping in to the van gogh museum. Didn't really know much apart from the fame and the ear thing before i went there, as you don't, really. Now, I know that many Artists are Troubled, yada yada yada, but due I think to the outstanding design of the display I found the whole thing unexpectedly moving; there was a bit of context downstairs (exhibition of painters who'd been influential to van gogh), then a short biography on the wall before a chronological exhibition.

the biggest thing for me was the sunflowers.

That's the one (ones) we all know about... this is the story. vincent had a kind of vision of this artist community which he thought would emerge from this house he saw. So he rented it, or something, i don't know, maybe he bought it, with high hopes and a sense of creative possiblity. He painted five sunflower pictures to decorate the room his friend gaugin moved into; he'd taken a little persuading, but was an artist as well, and despite his misgivings was sufficiently convinced about the concept to give it a go. So essentially, they weren't painted as a commercial enterprise (and he was definately out for that - becoming a painter was a career move (he was going to be a minister before that)) but for his mate's room in a house to which he dreamed people would be drawn, such an atmosphere of creativity and such a load of bloody great paintings and painters were there. Sort of thing.

Within three months the ear incedent happened; he and gaugin argued loads generally and he couldn't remember the details of the night his ear was cut. Some people think gaugin might have cut it off in a rage, but he wasn't about to admit it and van gogh just thought he'd done it himself. Gaugin left. Van gogh thought he'd scared him off. Probably he did. They never saw each other again. Van gogh was a bit of a local laughing stock generally. He left the place.

Upstairs in the van gogh museum there is a room of books, and I did a bit more reading about him and his life. It's sad, and the whole poignance is embellished by the fact that his (prolific) letter writing has been pretty much preserved, so those who are interested have an alarming level of insight into what was going on and how he was feeling throughout his life. Mostly he felt disappointed.

The sunflowers, though, and his vision for that house. It wasn't the failure that got to me. It was the hope.