Even if you are not interested in art or painting, we are sure that when you have to count a few painters, one of them will be Van Gogh. Vincent Willem Van Gogh, with his full name, was born in 1853 and passed away in 1890. The works of this painter, who died at a very young age, are invaluable today, but he could not sell almost any paintings when he was alive and died in misery.
The painter Van Gogh, who is known as such even today because he cut off his ear as a result of tragic events, lived a life full of difficulties. He could not find what he was looking for from the art of painting, which he devoted his life to, and could not make his name known. Unfortunately, his value was known after his death and his name became associated with the most famous painters of history. Let’s take a closer look at the information you will hear for the first time about Van Gogh, who fascinated everyone with his works.
Interesting facts about Van Gogh:
Van Gogh is one of the most influential painters in the history of art:
Born in 1853, Van Gogh worked many different jobs until he was 27 years old. Having worked in countless jobs, including teaching and art dealership, Van Gogh finally decided to focus all his energies on the painting that he fell in love with. According to many painters, he started painting at a late age, but we can say that he threw up the accumulation of so many years.
Van Gogh painted 900 oil paintings and more than 2000 drawings during the ten years until his death in 1890 at the age of 37. Van Gogh, who made these in a short period of ten years, produced a piece every 36 hours when the average is calculated. Such a number is rare to find in the history of art. For this reason, Van Gogh is considered one of the most influential painters in the history of art.
He had to struggle with mental illness throughout his short life:
When we look at all the records about the life of the Dutch painter Van Gogh, we can definitely say that he struggled with many different mental illnesses for most of his short life. He was showing different symptoms such as hallucinations, depression and attacks.
Today, we cannot say with certainty which psychological disorders Van Gogh struggled with. However, it seems highly likely that he has many different disorders and combinations of them, such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, syphilis, hypergraphia, Geschwind syndrome, temporal lobe epilepsy. It is estimated that all these disorders, which started as a few simple symptoms, turned into more intense attacks over time.
He drank a lot of alcohol, smoked a lot of coffee and cigarettes, and ate only bread:
Van Gogh suffered a lot of poverty, especially during his adult life. Because of this, he could never be fed properly. He drank a lot of alcohol to suppress his mental illness, drank coffee when he wasn’t drinking, never let go of his pipe for a moment, and ate only bread as a meal. This diet was making his mental and physical health worse.
Throughout his life, Van Gogh’s brother Theo had been his biggest supporter. He was also providing financial support, but Van Gogh used this financial support to buy much higher quality materials. In a letter to his brother, he mentioned that he ate six meals a year and that his teeth were so loose that they fell out. When he died, it was seen that his body was extremely weak.
He was known as the ‘Red-haired madman’ around him:
The severity of the psychological disorders Van Gogh struggled with was increasing day by day. He did not ignore them and was frequently hospitalized for treatment. However, there was no cure. The pain he felt during his symptoms began to bother not only himself, but everyone around him.
After Van Gogh, who has red hair and beard, began to disturb his neighbors during the attacks, they began to call him le fou roux, which means red-haired madman. When the discomfort became unbearable, his neighbors signed a petition against him. With this petition, Van Gogh was evicted from his home and began to stay in the hospital.
Van Gogh did indeed cut off his ear, but why he did it is unknown even today:
Even those who do not know any of Van Gogh’s works know the legend that he cut off his own ear. Yes, Van Gogh cut off his ear, but even today we don’t know for sure why he did it. According to a rumor, he had an argument with his friend, threatened him with a razor, but instead of hurting him, he cut it in his own ear, put it in a handkerchief and gave it to a prostitute.
According to another rumor, his friend Gaugin, with whom he had an argument, cut off Van Gogh’s ear. Guagin, a fencer, cut off Van Gogh’s ear with his sword during a fight. However, the duo covered up the incident in this way to avoid dealing with the police. Contrary to popular belief, only a part of Van Gogh’s earlobe was cut off, not an entire ear.
Van Gogh drew a lot of himself because he had no money to pay for the model:
When we look at the countless works that Van Gogh gave during his short life, we see that he drew himself a lot. It is normal for painters to draw self-portraits, but it is strange that they draw so many. Van Gogh painted 43 self-portraits because he did not have enough money to hire a model to paint. Therefore, he went in front of the mirror and drew himself. In most of these self-portraits, Van Gogh portrayed himself with a stubble beard, sunken eyes, weak chin, missing teeth and a bandaged ear.
Another method Van Gogh used to cut costs was to paint over the paintings. Instead of buying a new canvas, the painter was completely painting over a painting he had drawn before and was drawing a new painting on top of it. In other words, we say that he drew thousands of pictures, but when we think that there is another picture under many of them, the number of the artist’s works can be inconceivably large.
We tried to get to know this art genius better by talking about little-known facts about Van Gogh, who is considered one of the most important painters in history, whose value is known after his death. Do you like the works of Van Gogh? You can share your thoughts in the comments.
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