Vincent Van Gogh

Vincent Van Gogh Wall Art

In the last quarter of the 19th century Van Gogh introduced to us a misunderstood martyr of modern times, finding the only refuge in his artistic aspirations. Being a son of a Brabant pastor, that indelibly influenced Vincent’s personal or professional evolution, the Dutch Artist represented a typical example of an individual who had never betrayed his objectives notwithstanding his overwhelming internal conflicts or multiple external obstacles.

During his Hague and Nuenen periods marking the commencement of the Painter’s non-amateur activity in the huge artistic world, Van Gogh revealed special fondness towards Barbizon school and particularly, Jean Fracois Millet’s realism (Peasant Woman Digging, Sheepshearer,etc.). The Dutch origins of the Painter are equally apparent in his early works meeting their apex in the acclaimed “The Potato Eaters”. Besides showing the contradictions of the life of poor dwellers, Van Gogh simultaneously displays his expressionism-based inclinations with next to zero effort and superb attention to detail perceived through clearly articulated brush movements.

In 1886, moving from Holland to Paris accelerated the initiation of a totally new era in the life of Dutch painter and perhaps, in the entire art history. After getting acquainted with the leaders of impressionist movement, the Artist found new strengths in himself, allowing him to go against the flow, leaving beyond even then-dominating trend and surpass art world’s expectations by presenting himself as one of the founders of Post-impressionism. Paris has influenced and transformed lots of painters. Van Gogh was no exception. Inhabiting palette with lighter shades, dividing his characteristic brush movements into tinier and sharper ones, that at the same time emphasized his increasingly irritable nature, and rejecting perspective-oriented rules, Van Gogh introduced colour as the main means of compositional structure (Café Terrace at Night).

Upon his settlement in Arles, the Dutch virtuoso became even more excited by the one-of-a kind, bright sunlight and flamboyant colours of southern France that, in his view, ensured utmost importance of oil paints. Indeed, the latter acquired a completely distinct value in the hands of the Dutch artist, reminding of psycho-physiological factors most of the time. Intense yellow, blue, red and purple colour contrasts, influenced somewhat by Van Gogh’s cherished Japanese art (Portrait of Pere Tanguy, Bridge in the Rain), appeared the only contributors to unconventional compositional structures (Café at Night, The Yellow House, Les Alyscamps, Still Life=Drawing Board with Onions, etc.), being eventually discharged from ever-popular subject matters and putting forward ordinary objects as the main ‘culprits’ of the spectator’s interest (The Bedroom, The Chair, Boots, etc.)

His late, prior-to-suicide, works even lose track of any firmness and enable the Painter to dive into colour-filled ocean (Landscape of Auvers in the Rain, Sheaves of Wheat; Haystacks on a Rainy Day).

“It is not the language of painters but the language of nature which one should listen to, the feeling for the things themselves, for reality is more important than the feeling for pictures”.

Vincent Van Gogh

Nature was always a kind home for Vincent – a home that he could never share with anyone else, perhaps, except for his younger brother, Theo, the plentitude of letters to whom may serve as the best interpretation for the whole artistic patrimony of Van Gogh.

Blue Horizon Prints has a number of gorgeous Wall Art Prints of some of Vincent Van Gogh’s most famous paintings for sale.