Vincent van Gogh
March 30, 1853 – July 29, 1890
Dutch Post-Impressionist painter of The Starry Night and Sunflowers, little known in his lifetime.
Biography
Vincent van Gogh was born in the Netherlands in 1853, the son of a pastor. He worked as an art dealer, teacher and lay preacher before he started to paint in 1880.
In ten years he made about 2,100 works, among them The Potato Eaters, Sunflowers and The Starry Night. After moving to Paris and then to Arles in southern France, he developed the bold colours and expressive brushwork that influenced Expressionism.
He suffered from mental illness, cut off part of his ear in 1888, and spent a year in an asylum at Saint-Rémy. He sold very few paintings in his lifetime and died of a gunshot wound in 1890, generally believed to be suicide. His fame grew rapidly after his death.
Affiliations
Employment
- Jul 1, 1869 – Jan 1, 1876 Goupil & Cie Art dealer trainee and clerk in The Hague, London and Paris; dismissed 1876