HEROIN IS A DRUG TO MAKE THE WORLD GO AWAY

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Monday 23 July 2012

Vincent Van Gogh: Bipolar On Canvas




ヴィンセント·ヴァン·ゴッホ:キャンバスに双極性障害




 
 
WHEN I'M MANIC, THE LIGHTS LOOK TRANSCENDENTLY BEAUTIFUL...


WHEN I HAD SEVERE "CHRONIC FATIGUE SYNDROME" IN THE 90s THE WORLD LOOKED LIKE THIS: CROOKED AND DROWNED IN PHOTOPHOBIC COLOUR...


SOMETIMES THE ENTIRE WORLD SEEMED TO BE CRACKLING WITH MANIC ELECTRICITY...


WHETHER OR NOT VAN GOGH WAS CLINICALLY BIPOLAR IS ALMOST IMMATERIAL; HE CAPTURED THE EXTREMES OF THE CONDITION ON CANVAS.
HERE THE FIELD IS BURSTING WITH A BLAZE OF MANIC GLORY.
THE SKY SEEMS OMINOUS. MOODS ALREADY MIXED, THREATENING DESPAIR...


DEPRESSION AND DESPERATION WERE NEVER FAR AWAY...


HE CUT OFF HIS EAR. AND LOOK AT THE BACKGROUND OF GLARING ORANGE;
THE MOOD IS CYCLING YET AGAIN



EIGHTEEN MONTHS AFTER CUTTING OFF HIS RIGHT EAR, VINCENT VAN GOGH DIED OF SELF-INFLECTED GUNSHOT WOUNDS.

HE SOLD ONLY ONE PAINTING IN HIS LIFETIME.

18 comments:

Bev said...

I love Vincent.I love the top painting most.I cant believe he cut his ear off for a girl.He must have been heart broken and desperate the poor man.I love Don mCleans gong for him to.

Bev said...

Oh I never noticed the video of the hamsters before.Are they yours?they l.Do they play in the empty toilet paper rolls?There so cute.Are they full of love and affection?I love to have one.Ping pong size is so small.Did you have them on your couch?I want one!

Gledwood said...

I remember this 100 yr old + lady appeared on the evening news from France... she was so old, she remembered Vincent Van Gough and all she could say about him was that he "had bad breath"...

the hamsters are all sadly dead. They died about 3 years ago. Yes they did love to run through the toilet tubes. And to nibble the sides of them. They were very skittish and flighty and didn't like being picked up, though they would walk up to my hands in the fishtank and one, Itchy, used to let me pick her up, although it was fairly obvious she didn't really like it.

I used to take Itchy out of the tank when I was high on heroin. Then I'd fall unconscious and the little swine would escape for days at a time! I only caught her by throwing teeshirts or teatowels over her. And she was very offended to be returned so swiftly home!

Bev said...

Itchy was foxy to know the right time to disappear.If I had one it will have to put up with lots of touching and hand holding.I can not resist just looking at them.I love them.

Gledwood said...

They hate being held! Unless brought up with regular handling from babyhood. Bugerlugs's roborovski hamsters are all hand-tame...

Furtheron said...

Always find that 1 painting bit amazing frankly - love the one of the church, if I save up do you think I could afford it?

Gledwood said...

You'd have to save up every penny you earned, and not pay any tax, for at least fifty lifetimes even to afford a cheap Van Gogh painting, though a sketch would probably set you back far less...

Gledwood said...

Furtheron: that is on the assumption that males earn nowadays on average one million pounds in the course of their working life, and that a cheap Van Gogh costs about £50 million... I think they're a bit more nowadays.)

According to Wikipedia's Most Expensive Paintings page

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_expensive_paintings

Van Gogh's portrait of Dr Gachet, which cost $82.5 million in 1990 is now worth $146.5

Portrait of the Artist Without Beard went for $71.5 million in 1998 ~ now said to be worth $100 million (purely adjusting for inflation)

Portrait of Joseph Roulin: $58 million, 1989; c$108 million today (only part of the $58 million was paid in cash; the rest by an exchange of artworks)

A Wheatfield With Cypresses was $57 million in 1993; now $90.7 million.

Vase With Fifteen Sunflowers ~ $39.7 million (£24.75 million) in 1987; $81.2 million today.

Peasant Woman Against A Background of Wheat $47.5 million in 1997; $67.9 million today.

jams o donnell said...

A marvelous artist. Ever been to the Rijksmuseum van Gogh in Amsterdam?

Gledwood said...

No but I'd love to go. Seen the room full of Van Goghs in the Musee D'Orsay in Paris; that was amazing!

Furtheron said...

hmmm - bit of an ask on the saving up front that one sadly ;-) Just have to nick one

bugerlugs63 said...

Probably all that Absinthe . . . Van gogh, that is, not you!
Have to rush as tons to do, I've put some pics up of your pups.
Take care, with love x x x

Welshcakes Limoncello said...

The paintings have never really appealed to me but I do love that song, as your first commenter says.

Btw, Gleds, I didn't have any luck finding the video for you. Sorry.

Anonymous said...

Van Gough is one of my favorite visual artists. I got to see a Van Gough exhibit when I was in NYC, back in 2005. His paintings are SO colorfull, replicas and pictures of the original do not do his work justice. His self portriates are my favorites.
I wonder what his diagnosis was when he was alive, and what it would be today?

Gledwood said...

ANNA: I think the diagnosis was epileptic seizures with some kind of unspecified insanity. I think nowadays he would be considered bipolar type 1 or schizoaffective bipolar. He did seem to be very manic-depressive.

WELSHCAKES: a lot of people think his paintings look amateurish. I've seen his sketches and they look perfect (no distortions in perspective). I get the impression what he painted was what he saw. And that's what's interesting...

BUGERLUGS: they do say that absynthe could have caused some of the effects, eg halos round the lights... but he spent weeks at a time in the lunatic asylum. Surely he wasn't high on absynthe in there... or was he.?.. Who knows!!

FURTHERON: when I was in the Orsay Museum I kept thinking "this is one billion pounds worth of art in one room. Wow!" More than I thought about the actual paintings. I do remember being able to lean in and see the light glinting off the brushstrokes. Which of course you would never get from a printed reproduction. I'd like to have some of his works in life-sized prints. I wonder where you get them from..?

Luna_mama said...

I replied to you on my blog...would really like your opinion if you have time?

thanks xx

Gledwood said...

I answered you. :-)

Yeah heroin did feel like the best medication I'd ever tried. For a while...

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