the real van gogh

Monday, 25 January 2010

First Impressions: The Real Van Gogh

by Kathryn Hadley

‘The Real Van Gogh: The Artist and His Letters’ opened this weekend at the Royal Academy of Arts. The exhibition focuses on Van Gogh’s correspondence to provide an insight into his ideas about art, nature and literature and the way he defined himself as an artist and human being. Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890) wrote mostly to his younger brother Theo (1857-1891), who was an art-dealer and supported Vincent both emotionally and financially throughout his life and career.

Other letters are addressed to his sister Willemien and to fellow artists including Paul Gauguin. Many are illustrated with small detailed sketches which Van Gogh used to show a work in progress. The first major Van Gogh exhibition in Lon- don for over 40 years, ‘The Real Van Gogh’ provides a fascinating glimpse into the mind of a misunderstood and misrep- resented artist. The diversity and ver- satility of his works is striking; the breadth of his talent, which was only recognised after his death, is stunning.

Vincent van Gogh was born in Groot-Zundert in the southern Netherlands in 1853. His father Theodorus van Gogh was a Protestant pastor of the Dutch reformed Church. Vincent began work, in 1869, for Goupie & Cie a firm of art-dealers in The Hague. He was thereafter transferred to London and then to Paris. His employment was, however, terminated in 1876 and the following year he travelled to Amsterdam to study theology. In 1879, he began working as a missionary in a mining region in Belgium.

Van Gogh’s career as an artist did not begin until 1880, when he was 27. During his relatively short ten-year artistic career he produced over 800 paintings and 1,200 drawings. In the last 70 days of his life, he completed more than 70 works. On July 27th, 1890, aged 37, Van Gogh shot himself in the chest. He died two days later.

Van Gogh is most famous for his colourful depictions of still lives and landscapes using rhythmic and swinging brush strokes; however, the majority of his paintings were in black and white. He only used colour during the last four years of his career after he moved to Paris in February 1886. The first section of the exhibition is devoted to Van Gogh’s Dutch landscapes, which he painted, at the beginning of his career, in black and white and shades of brown.

For Van Gogh one of the key duties of an artist was to study and depict nature. He wrote in a letter to Theo in July 1882: ‘the duty of the painter is to study nature in depth and to use all his intelligence, to put his feelings into his work so that it becomes comprehensible to others’.

Van Gogh’s art was rooted in nature, and he returned to nature during the last years of his career, with his depictions of the seasons and landscapes of Provence that are most typically associated with him. From Dutch landscapes, however, he moved on to depict figures and the farm labourers and local weavers of the rural community of Nuenen, where he lived between 1883 and 1885.

Van Gogh became a colourist when he moved to Paris in February 1886. Based on his studies of Eugene Delacroix (1798-1863) and Adolphe Monticelli (1824-1886), he deve- loped a theory of contrasting complementary colours (red and green, blue and orange, yellow and violet), which he perfected in a series of flower and fruit still lives. In the summer of 1887, he produced Two Cut Sunflowers, one of his earliest depictions of sun- flowers. Van Gogh’s paintings became even more colourful when he moved to Arles in Provence two years later. He worked on a series of canvases based on complementary colours and increasingly came to view colour as a means to convey feeling and visual energy rather than reality.

A second secret and often underestimated facet of Van Gogh’s work is the influence of Japanese art. Van Gogh’s fascination with Japanese wood- block prints also developed following his move to Paris, where japonisme, the taste for all things Japanese, was very fashionable at the end of the 19th century.

Vincent and his brother began a collection of Japanese woodblock prints by Utagawa Hiroshige and he later informed Theo that ‘all my work is based to some extent on Japanese art’. This Japanese influence is striking in the series of paintings and drawings that Van Gogh completed in Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer on the Rhone delta.

Although Van Gogh's gift for writing letters is somewhat obscured, the breadth of his talent as an artist shines nonetheless: he drew and he painted, in both colour and black and white, he painted landscapes, portraits and still lives, and was strongly influenced by Japanese art. 1

The Real Van Gogh: The Artist and His Letters
Until April 18th
Royal Academy of Arts
Burlington House, Piccadilly
London W1J 0BD
Telephone: 020 7300 8000
http://www.royalacademy.org.uk/

before break dancing

from THE TALES OF ISE (Ise Monogatari)

In the past, there was a prince known as Prince Koretaka. He had a palace at a place called Minase, on the far side of Yamazaki. Every year when the cherry blossoms were in full bloom, he went to that palace. On those occasions he always took along a person who was the director of the right imperial stables. It was long ago and I have forgotten his name.

Not enthusiastic about hunting, they just drank saké continuously and turned to composing poems in Japanese. The cherry blossoms at the Nagisa residence in Katano, where they often hunted, were especially beautiful. They dismounted under the trees, and breaking off blossoms to decorate themselves, everyone, of high, middle, and low rank, composed poems. The director of the stables composed this:

If only this world
were without cherry blossoms
then would our hearts
be at ease
in springtime.

Another person composed this:

It is because they fall soon
that the cherry blossoms
are so admired.
What can stay long
in this fleeting world?

When they left the trees to return to Minase, it already was dark. The prince's attendants came from the fields with servants bringing the saké. Seeking out a good place to drink it, they came to a place called Amanokawa. The director of the stables gave the prince a cup of saké. The prince said, “When you hand me the cup, compose a poem on coming to the banks of Amanokawa after hunting at Katano.” The director of the stables composed this and handed it to him:

I've spent the day hunting
and now will seek lodging
from the Weaver Maid
for I have come
to the River of Heaven.

The prince recited this over and over but could not come up with a response. Ki no Aritsune was attending the prince. He responded:

She who waits patiently
for a lord who comes
but once a year
will not, I am sure,
lodge any other.

They went back to Minase, and the prince entered his palace. They drank and conversed until deep in the night, and then the prince prepared to sleep, somewhat drunk. As the moon of the eleventh day of the month began to sink behind the mountains, the director of the stables composed this:

How can the moon
hide itself
before we are satisfied?
I wish the mountain rim would flee
so the moon might stay in view.

In place of the prince, Ki no Aritsune replied:

I wish the peaks
one and all
might be leveled:
if there were no mountain rims
the moon would not hide.

Narihira (Ariwara no Narihira) (825–80)

translation by Lewis Cook and Jamie Newhard

museum monday

This exhibition includes about 120 works by the leading designers and fabricators of late nineteenth- to early twentieth-century Art Nouveau jewelry. Although many of these artists acquired their skills in traditional, high-style jewelry houses, they found inspiration in the work of the Pre-Raphaelites, the philosophy of John Ruskin (1819–1900), the paintings and poetry of the symbolists, and the arts of Japan.

For motifs, they looked to the flora (orchids, lilies) and fauna (dragonflies, butterflies) of the natural world and the sensuality of the female form.

This new aes- the- tic was, in large measure, a reaction against nineteenth century historicism, industrialization, and the “tyranny of the diamond,” and these Art Nouveau artists chose to interpret nature rather than imitate it. 1

MFA Boston • Avenue of the Arts • 465 Huntington Avenue • Boston, Massachusetts 02115-5523 • 617-267-9300

a couple of exciting exhibitions at the MOMA almost worth flying to new york for (also remember):

Batiste Madalena: Hand-Painted Film Posters for the Eastman Theatre, 1924–1928 October 15, 2008–April 6, 2009
and

Van Gogh and the Colors of the Night
September 21, 2008–January 5, 2009

check out the wonderful site

MOMA • 11 West 53 Street • between Fifth and Sixth avenues • New York NY 10019-5497 • 212- 708-9400

courtesans, prostitutes & whores: Part II Prostitutes

as you study this subject the realization that begins to dawn on you that the two main reasons prostitutes were such favored subjects in france were that the artwork sold well, and artists were often encouraged to paint life in the brothels by their galleries and agents; as we saw in the discussion about grun, an illusion was being constructed, and all forms of artist were enlisted in the name of this goal. but more importantly, many a lonely painter could find insufficient human warmth and solace elsewhere. toulouse-lautrec, degas, van gogh... men known to have never formed a long-term, settled relationship in their lifetimes. the holy grail.

further, visual artists could often escape censorship of their work by its acceptance as illustration, or as art. it was written in guidebooks that whores posted for photographs but it was nicer girls who posed for the paintings. some, like bernard, had never been in a brothel himself, but painted up an entire series of 'visits' and mailed them to van gogh!

van gogh's response: ...And now that I have started thanking you, I thank you furthermore for the batch of sketches entitled “At the Brothel.” Bravo! It seems to me that the woman washing herself and the one saying, “There is none other like me when it comes to exhausting a man,” are the best; the others are grimacing too much, and above all they are done too vaguely, they are too little living flesh, not built up sufficiently. But no matter, these other ones too are something quite new and interesting. At the brothel! Yes, that's what one ought to do, and I assure you that I for one am almost jealous of the damned fine opportunity you will have of going there in your uniform, - which these good little women dote on. 1

There were several different kinds of brothels in Paris during the time of Victor Hugo's Les Miserables, and like the varying levels prostitutes which corresponded to each social class, there were also several different levels of brothels.




On one side of the spectrum were luxury brothels, which catered to wealthier, bourgeois clients. These offered more elaborate setting as well as more elaborate sexual spectacles and practices. They cost approximately 100 francs a night. The most common whorehouse was geared towards the working class, and offered more traditional settings and practices. (These types usually cost 5-10 francs for a "brief encounter" and 10-20 to spend the night.)

Meanwhile, lower class whorehouses which cost only one franc, were even more stripped down. With each step down in quality and price, the brothel became less refined, as did the clients who frequented them. 2





it has been written that the strong prostitution presence in new orleans came from being settled by the french.





His first commercial poster, Moulin Rouge: La Goulue (1891), contrasts the seductive performance of La Goulue (The Glutton), one of the dance hall's most famous stars, with an anonymous, predominantly male audience identifiable as middle class by the ubiquitous top hat. Such sexually suggestive images—a direct result of the loosening of censorship laws in 1881—created a sensation with the Parisian public as they both assaulted bourgeois morals and transformed Montmartre's working-class performers into overnight celebrities.

By the time of the World's Fair held in Paris in 1900, Montmartre had developed into a veritable entertainment industry, boasting over forty venues comprised of cabarets, café-concerts, dance halls, music halls, theaters, and circuses. The area's underground bohemian culture had become a part of mainstream bourgeois entertainment through the rapid commercialization and marketing of its venues and performers.

As a result, Toulouse-Lautrec and his avant-garde contemporaries lost interest in Montmartre's nightlife and sought their modern subjects elsewhere. What had begun as a critique of decadent society had become a symbol of decadence itself.

Nicole Myers
Department of Nineteenth-Century, Modern, and Contemporary Art,
The Metropolitan Museum of Art 3

The nineteenth-century brought about a radical transformation of the role of the European artist. Instead of working on commission for aristocratic patrons, artists in all media were more and more left to their own devices, creating works of art alone in their studios and then sending them into the market place hoping to attract a buyer and secure a sale. Innovative forms, new subjects and styles emerged from the changing economic structure brought about by the dawning of the industrial age and the importance of urban cities.

The new clientele the artist sought to attract was increasingly comprised of the nouveau riche and the urban bourgeoisie and by the mid-nineteenth century the involvement of an anonymous public in artistic matters was an irrevocable fact that had been secured by mass production. New processes in lithographic printing and of the photographic print made art available to the general populace – the democratization of art coincided with the diversity of the japonisme movement of nineteenth-century France. 4

trees III

although its practice was known in china and korea before it was seen in japan, the art of bonsai, as we in the west have come to know it, is certainly the japanese strain. though it is said that the practice originated as an easy way to transport medicinal herbs, it must be added that the singularization and stylization of nature occurred not only on a miniature scale.

as seen in yesterday's examples from japan, art was never limited to the creations of humans, but was included as well the creations outside the hands of humans. gardens featured stylized mountains and oceans; and real trees were stylized as well. though what we see in the western images of stylized trees were inspired by those in the japanese prints, in the japanese prints themselves they were often featuring what they literally saw.

The most frequently cited example of mono no aware in contemporary Japan is the traditional love of cherry blossoms, as manifested by the huge crowds of people that go out every year to view (and picnic under) the cherry trees. The blossoms of the Japanese cherry trees are intrinsically no more beautiful than those of, say, the pear or the apple tree: they are more highly valued because of their transience, since they usually begin to fall within a week of their first appearing. It is precisely the evanescence of their beauty that evokes the wistful feeling of mono no aware in the viewer. 1

A distinctive Japanese convention is to depict a single environment transitioning from spring to summer to autumn to winter in one painting. For example, spring might be indicated by a few blossoming trees or plants and summer by a hazy and humid atmosphere and densely foliated trees, while a flock of geese typically suggests autumn and snow, and barren trees evoke winter. (Because this convention was so common, seasonal attributes could be quite subtle.) In this way, Japanese painters expressed not only their fondness for this natural cycle but also captured an awareness of the inevitability of change, a fundamental Buddhist concept. 2

As previously noted, the garden as we know it came to Japan from China. During the Han Dynasty, the emperor Wu Di (140-87 BC) established a garden containing three small islands, mimicking the Isles of the Immortals, who were the principle Taoist deities. These gardens of lakes and mountains became the standard of the day, always representing (in abstract) the fabled lands of legend. There was no effort made to approximate nature; it was stylized into something otherworldly. In 607AD, the emperor Yang Di opened relations with Japan, and received the first envoy, Ono no Imoko, at his lavish park. Imoko returned to Japan with many ideas (including Buddhism), and four years after his return, the first hill and pond garden was established in Japan. 3

from hiroshige commest all things

the more i study the visual arts of this period the more i am astonished i am at the breadth of influence of hiroshige (whose work was, perhaps, the first stuff available).






the latest thing i've found, here, are some of dulac's illustrations for hawthorn's tanglewood tales. (though i'll admit that i think i could eventually find them all if every hiroshige print were online.)









we saw czeschka's inspired interpretation of hiroshige's eagle, and now we see dulac's bow as well.









we also saw czeschka's modelling of a boat after hiroshige's method of portraying them, and here we have dulac's too.

•

aha! i have identified one of the images in the background of one of the pere tanguy portraits. i will assume that van gogh did with these what he did with the others -- he traced the prints themselves, then made a grid and transferred them this way. just below that is the same kiesai eisen image we saw here.




and of course, hiroshige did the original.














just as a side note: i guess that another way to do it is the way miro did with his friend ricart: he pasted it on! (have yet to identify that one, though.)

(p.s. doesn't that 'eye' on this boat resemble the one on dulac's boat?)

the flowering of japan in van gogh's heart

For two centuries, Japan discouraged trade with the rest of the world. In the 1850s, however, the country finally bowed to outside pressure and opened its ports to foreign vessels and Western commercial interests. Japanese prints, lacquerware, and porcelains flooded into Europe, creating a craze for furniture and crafts of Japanese design.

European artists were eager to abandon the staid conventions of academic art, and they freely imitated the bold, pure color, assertive outlines, and cropped compositions of Japanese prints. Japanese art created an indelible impression on Van Gogh.

He, like many of his colleagues, avidly collected woodblock prints: "We like Japanese painting, we are influenced by it-all Impressionists have that in common."1










The nineteenth-century woodblock print by Keisai Eisen depicting a high-ranking courtesan (oiran) was reproduced in reverse on the cover of Paris Illustré, in a special edition entitled "Le Japon" (May 1886).








When Van Gogh saw the magazine, he made a tracing of the cover incorporating a grid that he later transferred in enlarged form to canvas. 2

[this is the same method he used when making the other above copies]







and this is van gogh's friend whom he called pere tanguy. he was an art supply dealer.
i would love to find the originals for all of the prints shown behind him (in both versions), as well as in the few additional prints in which he featured them, but so far no luck.




(previous coverage here)