Vincent Van Gogh: Later Years

Vincent Van Gogh: Later Years

A Brief Understanding of Van Gogh's Later Years.

In 1881, at the age of 27, Gogh moved back in with his parents after completing nine months of further education at Brussels. At home Gogh set to work on teaching himself how to draw. He tested various different techniques and styles along with experimenting with different subject matters. Other areas he work on mastering were perspective, shading, and anatomy. Many of his earliest pieces were of pheasant life, which could be attributed with his work with the miners of Borinage. Gogh soon became passionate about becoming an acclaimed drawer of figures, and continued to practice his newly developed skills. By the end of 1881 Gogh had moved from his parent's house and was acquiring lessons from Anton Mauve, his cousin by way of marriage. Gogh also began a relationship with Sien Hoomik, a pregnant prostitute whom had had one child out of wedlock already. Gogh was deeply shunned by Mauve for this relationship thus causing the two to fall out of friendship. However, Gogh continued to master the skills of drawing and used Hoomik as a model whenever possible.

Vincent soon became irritable and made the choice to break off his relationship with Hoomik and move once again to follow artists like Van Rappard and Mauve to Drenthe. Gogh soon found a lack of inspiration and models to trying and moved back in with his parents to continue practice. Here Gogh was first introduced to the paintings of Jean-Franqois Millet, French who had become quite famous across Europe for his renditions of pheasant life. Van Gogh began painting and he forcibly modeled his style after Millet. By the age of 29 Gogh had moved from his parents house and worked in a make shift studio located in a room he rented from a Catholic Church.

From the beginning of Van Gogh's artistic career he had the ambition to draw and paint figures, in 1884 he began working on mastering weathered hands, heads and other anatomical features of peasants. He was planning on creating a multiple figure piece that would push his name into a respected name of the artistic community. The piece he created was entitled 'The Potato Eaters' and was completed in 1885. This piece proved to be success, but not in his life time.

After the personal failure of 'The Potato Eaters' Vincent decided he needed some professional training in art techniques. He enrolled later that year in an academy in Antwerp where he discovered the art of Peter Paul Rubens, and various Japanese artists. Both of these factors would greatly affect Van Gogh's style in art. By early 1886 he had moved to Paris to live with his brother Theo. Here Gogh was immersed in a centrifuge of modern art from the impressionist and post impressionists. Van Gogh quickly dropped the dark colors he had used to create 'The Potato Eaters' after discovering the palette to be horrendously out of date. He adopted the brighter more vibrant colors with ease and began experimenting with the techniques he saw in the art of the impressionist and post impressionists. He soon began to research the styles found in the Japanese artwork he had discovered a year earlier.

While in Paris Gogh was acquainted with various other artists including: Paul Gauguin, Camille Pissarro, Claude Monet, and Emile Bernard. Likewise Vincent befriended Paul Gauguin and moved to Arles in 1888 hoping that his new friends would join him to create a school of art. Gogh was confident in his new and highly personal style and felt that he could attribute to modern art with his outlandish new color combinations.

Later Paul Gaugin did join Van Gogh in Arles. Gogh began painting sunflowers