Though in his youth Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890) displayed little to no interest in
art, and his path towards artistic achievement was a disjointed one, by the middle of
his life he had blossomed into a productive, albeit mainly self-taught, and highly
creative artist. His spent his early twenties as an art dealer, yet it was an endeavor at
which he ultimately failed. He temporarily held several other jobs, only to follow his
religious passion and study to become a minister, which he also fell short of
accomplishing. A visit to the French Realist painter Jules Breton, in the winter of
1879-80, ultimately inspired van Gogh to pursue art full-time and he dedicated his
early years in this endeavor to portray the hardworking lives of peasants. Van Gogh
traveled Europe during the early 1880s, practicing his art, but achieving little success.
He moved to Arles, in the south of France, in 1888, to renew his interest in painting
peasants, and worked alongside Gauguin for a time before a serious clash between
the two artists resulted in Gauguin’s abrupt departure.
Following his conflict with Gauguin in Arles in December 1888, during which Van
Gogh amputated a part of his own ear and then spent a year in an asylum at Saint-
Rémy, Van Gogh moved to Auvers-sur-Oise to be cared for, thanks to the
recommendation of his brother, the prominent art dealer, Theo van Gogh, by Dr. Paul
Gachet. Gachet was a physician as well as an Impressionist art collector and amateur
painter/printmaker who had treated Camille Pissarro (who had referred Gachet to
Theo van Gogh) and was friends with Manet, Renoir and Cézanne. In May 1890, Van
Gogh began his treatment with Dr. Gachet and soon after, at Gachet’s prompting,
etched a portrait of the doctor. With renewed vigor, Van Gogh wrote to his brother
Theo of plans he had to make additional etchings.
Sadly, Van Gogh never escaped the melancholy and mental illness that plagued him
during this time. Only two months after completing his etching of Dr. Gachet, on July
27, 1890, aged 37, he shot himself in the chest with a revolver. He remained alive for
29 hours after the incident and died, with his beloved brother Theo at his side, to
whom he uttered his final words: “The sadness will last forever.”
Van Gogh was highly anticipated at the Armory Show, as his reputation as a
groundbreaking artist had spread to America. One critic posited that
Bal à Arles
was
the most admired van Gogh painting exhibited at the Armory Show. There were 13
paintings by van Gogh included in the Show, three on loan by Émile Druet and one
from Artz & de Bois. His oil paintings were listed anywhere from $2,600 (around
$60,000 today) up to $16,200 ($370,000 today);
Montmartre
was listed with the
highest price at $26,000 (approximately $600,000 today.) Most of van Gogh’s
works from the Armory Show are now in museum collections:
Collines a Arles
(now
called
Mountains at Saint-Remy
) is in the collection of the Guggenheim Museum,
New York;
Bal a Arles (Dance Hall at Arles)
is in the collection of the Musée d’Orsay,
Paris; and
L’Olivier
(now called
Landscape with Figures
) is in the collection of the
Baltimore Museum of Art, formerly in the Cone Collection.
