Why Van Gogh Matters...

"Painters — to take them only — being dead and buried, speak to the next generation or to several succeeding generations through their work.

Is that all, or is there more besides? In a painter's life death is not perhaps the hardest thing there is.

For my own part, I declare I know nothing whatever about it. But to look at the stars always makes me dream, as simply as I dream over the black dots of a map representing towns and villages. Why, I ask myself, should the shining dots of the sky not be as accessible as the black dots on the map of France? If we take the train to get to Tarascon or Rouen, we take death to reach a star. One thing undoubtedly true in this reasoning is this: that while we are alive we cannot get to a star, any more than when we are dead we can take the train."

~ Vincent in a letter to his brother Theo , July 1888

I remember with great fondness the first time I approached the original Starry Night housed in the Museum of Modern Art in NYC. I had loved the whirly swirly landscape by Van Gogh from an early age. Something about the violent fluidity of the night sky and earth over which it reigned captured my youthful imagination. That was before I set eyes upon the masterpiece, when I finally saw it up close and in person I knew I was in love. Van Gogh's passionate expression of the beauty and glory of the countryside after evening has swept over it continues to thrill me to this day. I was and still am awe struck by the transfer of emotion by artist on to canvas and the manner in which it projected outward and then imprinted into my own spirit. Since that day, many years past, there has never been a doubt in my mind that viewing Van Gogh's work is a spiritual and sacred experience. That he never saw success during his life but continued to paint with prolific passion until his suicide in July of 1890 shows the depth of the artist's desire to create and contribute to his world. The significance of his contribution to not just the art world but the world in general can be seen in the way his life, not just his art, is the subject of novels, movies, and scholarly research. There is something magnetic about the tortured soul looking out at you from the myriad of Vincent's self-portraits. There is something moving in reading the insights and struggles of the deeply sensitive Dutch artist expressed in letters to his greatest supporter and brother, Theo. Even 120 years later the brilliance and tragedy of Vincent Van Gogh touches me deeply and teaches me about the fragility of human existence.

"How can I be useful, of what service can I be? There is something inside me, what can it be?"