My Man Vincent, from the Camera and The Brush...

May 20th, 2014

For the past six weeks I've been writing about one of my most beloved artists, Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890), as the subject of just one of the more than 20 chapters in the book I'm working on, scheduled for publication later this year.

Vincent Van Gogh, 1886
(Photograph by Victor Morin)

Until recently, I didn't think to look for a photograph of Vincent as a full-blown adult, probably because (1) I don't recall having seen one in any of the books and articles I've read about him over the years, and (2) because I didn't really think a photo of him in his later years actually existed.

So this evening I was delighted and then moved to discover a truly
magnificent photographic portrait of Van Gogh, taken in 1886 by photographer Victor Morin when Van Gogh was 35 years old and just four years away from his tragic death in 1890.

Last month, while researching for the Van Gogh chapter of my book, I had a closer look at yet another irreplaceable treasure from the timeless story of Van Gogh: an oil portrait by John Peter Russell, also created in 1886 and depicting Vincent in all his High Dutch elegance, scowling toward an audience that hardly existed for him, at a time when he was fast approaching the zenith of his powers as an artist.
One can't help wondering if the elegance in that portrait was genuine, or merely an intentionally flattering, grandiose figment of Russell's imagination -- and Van Gogh's, too.

"Portrait of Vincent Van Gogh"
by John Peter Russell

Genuine or not, what a magnificent portrait of him Russell painted! And Morin's photograph is just as powerful and psychologically probing as the painting. Both are full to overflowing with Vincent's unmistakeable melancholy, with his fatalistic view of himself and his prospects as an artist, and with a disturbing sense of his own imminent doom. Both images offer evidence that one can be strikingly handsome -- even noble in demeanor -- while in the throes of terrifying self-doubt and the deepest of depressions. But it's not really possible to hide such suffering entirely from the contemporary viewer -- especially because of the voluminous knowledge we've gained over the years from his letters to Theo and the formidable accumulation of well-researched, highly intelligent books about his life and art.

When looking directly into the eyes of both the photograph and the portrait, I can't help but wish I were sitting across a table from him at some starlit cafe in Paris or London, sipping absinthe (or something considerably less potent, of course) and -- knowing what I and thousands of others know of his creative genius -- reminding him that he really is a gifted artist -- assuring him he really is a good and decent man -- and admonishing him to understand that if he'll only buck it up, ignore his detractors and believe in himself, he'll one day be famous beyond his wildest imagination.

It's really true, Vincent! It really did come to pass. Now we can only hope, in our dreamier moments, that some day there'll be a way for you to learn just how beloved you really have become. Then you can just sit back, take a deep breath, marvel at the sheer volume and surpassing brilliance of your own inimitable accomplishments, and then laugh, loudly and with well-deserved satisfaction, at all those legions of people who didn't think you actually had it in you.