From Humanism to Mysticism: The Birth of Ecology in the Western Arts from Wordsworth and Constable to John Cage and Earth Day by Leonard George J

Author:Leonard, George J. [Leonard, George J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: George J. Leonard
Published: 2014-10-12T16:00:00+00:00

F. Van Gogh: Painting the Mystical Experience Itself

Following is a rough draft based on my classroom lectures from 1986 to 2014.

Now we come to what's called Post-Impressionism. what's the difference between Post-Impressionism and Impressionism? Primarily, a new concern with the istoria .

The Perfect Moment

By 1885 Monet and the Impressionists were heading for pure abstract color away from concern with human beings away from istoria . Some people wanted to find out if the new visual language of colors would express humanistic istoria .

Again, drama: Van gogh Gauguin. This would happen over and over in modern art. Picasso and Cubism, a new language of shapes, then he tries for Cubist drama, like Guernica .

kandinsky and "abstraction"

Later, the abstract expressionists try to use that visual language to express emotions and Freudian terrors but first comes Post Impressionism in the mid 1880s.

Be careful about art movement names! Often the movement got the name pinned on it much later by critics, and it stuck, often it was a bad name at first.

What a joy for a humanities teacher to teach Vincent Van Gogh—like a conductor getting a chance to do Beethoven's Ninth Symphony

Vincent Van Gogh 1853-1890

died at age 37

The greatest painter of all time?

Above, Michelangelo

frustrating—you study for years and can't

say Rogier Van Der Weyden the best

or the Master of Flemalle

wind up saying the Impressionists and Van Gogh (pronounced van-go ). You'll hear “van gog sometimes, since he's dutch. that died out i think

put up on board Bible 1885 .35

and boots with laces 1886 .59 so late

He is a religious personality not a painter, and he tried to express his religious vision of the world in religion first. Naturally, in the 19th century that proved impossible. He hated organized religion afterward. In 1882 or so he writes Theo of Carlyle's lovely little book, Heroes and Hero Worship . That book says the same figure born into worse and worse materialistic ages falls lower and lower.

He learns to paint rather late, and quite slowly, trying to express his religious vision of the world. First he tries drawing, then he tries color—that works. He draws with colors, it's said.

All the great stuff we think of as "Van gogh" is done in about four years! Sometimes two or three a day! No-one insane has that kind of self discipline

He was not "crazy. He had a kind of epilepsy which made him appear crazy for short periods. In between times he wasn't much worse than highstrung. Towards the end though he was deeply depressed by what seemed to be his complete failure to communicate his vision in art.

lonely, miserable—and then really terrified of what he'd do when he had his next attack

We started with Emma Bovary, and in a way, we’re ending with her––

as him. I invite you to think of Emma Bovary—who also tried avenue after avenue looking to escape from bourgeois society—she even turned to religion once!—and runs into the same kind of religion as Van Gogh did, dead, routine, and–– vaguely wondering is she’s nuts. And Emma also commits suicide.

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