Paul Gauguin : A Father

While the painters after the Impressionism period were collectively called the “Post-Impressionists,” the label is quite reductive. Each artist had their own unique style, from Seurat’s pointillism to Signac’s mosaic-like divisionism, Cezanne, Émile Bernard, and others. These artists were all connected in that they were reacting to the aesthetics of Impressionism. Two of the more influential painters from this movement were Vincent van Gogh and Paul Gauguin, who aimed to connect with viewers on a deeper level by access Nature’s mystery and meaning beyond its superficial, observable level. However, each artist’s approach to achieving this goal was different. In close examination of Vincent van Gogh’s Self-Portrait (Dedicated to Paul Gauguin) and Paul Gauguin’s Self-Portrait with Portrait of Émile Bernard (Les misérables), one may clearly see the two artists’ contrasting styles on display.

     Van Gogh's use of line really gives depth and character to the piece. The first line that caught my eye was the line outlining the bottom of the bed. The strong stroke really gives you a sense of distance between the bottom of the frame and the floor. Had it been a thin line like those to depict the floorboards, it would look like the bed was sitting directly on the floor. His use of brush strokes and the thickness of them vary immensely in the painting to create depth. The strong strokes of

In my research / readings of my chosen Artist, I found a lot of information about them that I will descibe individually. Based on the biography, It has been stated that Vincent “was a most well known post-impressionism Artist, for whom color was the chief symbol of expression, he was highly emotional, lacked self-confidence and struggled with his identity and with direction.” (Templeton Reid) In the late 1800’s is when Vincent basically made the decision to become an Artist, in which he wanted to provide some type of Happiness because he was able to create beauty (Templeton Reid). As you review the art chosen above by Vincent Van Gogh, you will notice the colors used were dark i.e. Greens, Oranges, Blues, with splashes of yellow to create the sun, which led me to believe that maybe this was when he was in the dark place of his life. In the Van Gogh painting, I see big trees with the nice bright sun shining over the blue water, while looking at the trees it makes me feel safe because of the openness of the surrounding space, also the brightness of the sun and the coolness of the water makes me calm and relaxed, it’s just something about being in nature that gives me a sense of peace and direction, nothing to distract or disturb me.

Vincent Van Gogh is one of the most infamous and influential artists of all time. When I saw that Van Gogh’s painting “Olive Trees With Yellow Sky and Sun” was on display at the Minneapolis Institute of Art, I knew I had to choose it for this paper. Before doing the research for this assignment, I didn’t know much about Vincent Van Gogh, but the fact that pretty much everyone knows his name and recognizes him as a huge part of art history, it made me naturally really curious about him.

This sky keeps the viewer's eyes stimulating about the painting, following the curves following the stars. Whereas "The potato eaters." was completed in 1885, is consider one of the many first great works of Van Gogh. While drawing this piece Van Gogh had only recently started painting and did not master the technique that would make his piece well-known. The painting consists of 5 figures sitting on the table eating potatoes, 4 women and one male. This piece had a darkness laced which led to mixed emotions. Looking at the piece you can almost hear the figures' conversation as if you are sitting with them on the table. The artist knew that his Starry Night synthesis was to some degree dreamlike and adapted and in a letter to his sibling he even alluded to "misrepresentations as far as the piece." The clear style picked by van Gogh was irregular - he picked lines to depict this night scene when outlines would have been a more evident decision. These subtle elements in "The potato eaters." are incorporated yet are not constrained to The crossbeam sheets in the back of the

On the other hand, Vincent van Gogh did not do any cubism work during his time as an artist, however, had more of an interest in drawing. Pablo Picasso had an interest in drawing too, but unlike his work, Vincent van Gogh’s drawings are appreciated without the need for bright colours, drawings such as his depiction of figures, light and landscape. Van Gogh drew using a lot of different media, such as chalks, red pen and charcoal, although he often mixed mediums as well when it came to drawing. He drew on not just paper, but a variety of paper types, and materials. However, Van Gogh’s methods of ‘drawing’ are very different to Pablo Picasso’s.

Additionally, Tanning uses value in this painting to take each component and make it more lifelike and visually appealing. This is especially notable when looking at the sunflower and the girls. When focusing on the flower, the petals which stand the highest have a much brighter yellow to them when compared to the lower petals. This is because the lower petals do not stand in the light, which causes them to appear darker in

The flowers face many angles and are all different, most have contrasting shades of green leaves surrounding the petals and varying stem widths and lengths. This creates interest throughout the painting. To complement the bright yellow flower petals, Van Gogh has detailed a baby blue background with small, vertical and horizontal brush strokes. This contrasts well with the yellow flowers and helps to separate them from the yellow foreground. Also, to break all the yellow sections, he has cleverly used a lighted yellow tint on the bottom half of the vase, rather than shades, which he has used to outline the petals of the flowers. In doing this and by also adding light to the front petals and vase, Van Gogh has added a third dimension to his painting. Like Olley, Van Gogh has painted this artwork in warm colours to create a joyful and uplifting artwork to look at.

The people back in the 19th century really didn’t accept Van Gaogh’s truthful and emotionally morbid way of expressing the way of art is to himself. It finally was seen as art through the people’s eyes. This set a stage of art that is now known as Expressionism. It is best characterized by the use of symbols and a style that expresses the artist’s inner feelings about his subject. His style of painting is exemplified by a projection of the painter’s inner experience onto the canvas he paints on. Van Gogh’s paintings are done with his feelings that goes on in his life. (Mark Harden’s Artchive)

A great artist once wrote, “If you hear a voice within you say 'you cannot paint,' then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced”. This artist was Vincent van Gogh, soon to be an appraised artist known all around the world for his works, such as Starry Night. He is one of the very first artists of the post-impressionist style than is now adored in every continent. However, there is much more to the man than one painting. Creating a full timeline that stretches beyond Gogh’s life, this paper will discuss the life of Vincent van Gogh and the impression he made on the world.

The portrait is displayed horizontally with a gold trimmed frame. The subject is a female that looks to be in her early 20’s sitting upright on a large brown chair. If the viewer travels up the painting the first indication of the woman’s class is her satin, blue dress. The saturated blue shines and falls in the light like water. Paired with the dress are her exceptionally detailed endings to her sleeves. The lace is even painted as though it is translucent, allowing a little of the blue dress to show through the sleeve. Flowers throughout history have symbolized innocence of a woman and her virginity. The repeating theme of flowers, in the sleeve cuffs and ribbon) in the woman’s attired suggests her purity or innocent nature. Another very details section of the painting includes the corset/torso details. The sewing suggests texture in the torso with small beading in between. Towards the top of the chest in the center, the female seems to bear an extravagant, ribbon piece with a tear drop bead in the center. The light pink

Although the use of line and light is not as defined as the color scheme, they still play an important role in the overall organization of the painting. Gauguin uses curvilinear lines throughout this work with no right angles or sharp points. The outlines in the background are fairly blurry and some of the lines blend into one another. In contrast, the characters in the foreground are comprised of precise, sharp lines. Gauguin goes as far as lightly outlining the bodies with a dark line in order to give them a sense of depth. Light also serves to enhance certain aspects of the painting. Gauguin has been careful in his use of light to create some areas of brightness and some of darkness. The central figure glows in the bright light, which shines down on her from above. This light shows the importance of the decision of whether to pick the fruit or not. It is focused so directly on one area and is void in the others.

Vincent Van Gogh was a master of the Post-Impressionist art movement; he created works that conveyed strong emotions through the simplest of elements. In Avenue of Poplars in Autumn, Van Gogh again shows his mastery of brushwork and color, giving the viewer a scene of a person walking from a home near dusk down an avenue lined with spindly poplars. Made in October of 1884, the painting seems to accurately reflect the season with red and brown leaves stubbornly adhering to the trees. The initial feeling of this piece is one of peace and calm. Autumn is a time for being with family and avoiding the cold. But the longer the viewer looks, the more they realize that this painting seems to show the opposite of a serene scene, creating an uneasy atmosphere. The feeling only grows when they see the shadows that lick the edges of the trees, the bar-like ruts in the road, and lone figure that walks steadily away from the empty house. In Avenue of Poplars in Autumn, Van Gogh strives to create a forbidding and frightening atmosphere through dark and contrasting colors, limited space, skewed balance, straight and diagonal lines, movement, and the subject matter of the painting, all to represent his emotional response to the scene.

Van Gogh was a Post Impressionist artist who painted expressively to portray emotions subjectively, like Gauguin, rather then

The one close relationship Van Gogh had with his siblings was with his brother Theo who supported him not only emotionally but financially. (Letters to Theo from Van Gogh are big parts in understanding Van Gogh’s life and the troubles he faced. published in 1959.) Van Gogh was largely self-taught as an artist, although he received help from his cousin, Mauve. His first works were heavily painted, mud-colored and clumsy attempts to represent the life of the poor (e.g. Potato-Eaters, 1885, Amsterdam), influenced by one of his artistic heroes, Millet. He moved to Paris in 1886, living with his devoted brother, Theo, who as a dealer introduced him to artists like Gauguin, Pissarro, Seurat and Toulouse-Lautrec. In Paris, he discovered color as well as the divisionist ideas which helped to create the distinctive dashed brushstrokes of his later work (e.g. Pere Tanguy, 1887, Paris). He moved to Arles, in the south of France, in 1888, hoping to establish an artists' colony there, and was immediately struck by the hot reds and yellows of the Mediterranean, which he increasingly used symbolically to represent his own moods (e.g. Sunflowers, 1888, London, National Gallery). He was joined briefly by Gauguin in October 1888, and managed in some works to combine his own ideas with the latter's Synthetism (e.g. The Sower, 1888, Amsterdam), but the visit was not a success. A final argument led to the infamous episode in which Van Gogh mutilated