Vincent Van Gogh

The son of a pastor, brought up in a religious and cultured atmosphere, Vincent was highly emotional and lacked self-confidence.In 1886 he went to Paris to join his brother Théo, the manager of Goupil's gallery. In Paris, van Gogh studied with Cormon, inevitably met Pissarro, Monet, and gauauin, and began to lighten his very dark palette and to paint in the short brushstrokes of the Impressionists. Van Gogh pursued him with an open razor, was stopped by Gauguin, but ended up cutting a portion of his own ear lobe off. Van Gogh then began to alternate between fits of madness and lucidity and was sent to the asylum in Saint-Remy for treatment. Van Gogh loved art from an early age. He began to draw as a child, and he continued making drawings throughout the years leading to his decision to become an artist. He did not begin painting until his late twenties, completing many of his best-known works during his last two years. In just over a decade, he produced more than 2,100 artworks, consisting of 860 oil paintings and more than 1,300 water colors, drawings,sketchesand prints. His work included self portaits, landscapes, still lifes portaits of flowers,and paintings of cypresses,wheat fields and sunflowers