| We have chosen to spotlight Vincent Van Gogh in this historical comparison because of his heavily textured canvases and choice of subject matter. As a self-taught artist Jimmie Johnson could not point to a particular person in art history that had influenced his work. So it was left up to us to decide upon an artist that we felt best matched Mr. Johnson's approach to painting. |
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We've all seen movies or read something about Vincent Van Gogh. Everyone knows that he cut off his ear, took his own life, and his paintings command the highest sums at auction. But did you know that he was a prolific writer, penning over a thousand letters to his brother Theo and other relatives? Rather than summarize his life here or conjecture his approach to painting I will give you excerpts from his letters in which he explains these things himself. |
| "I want you to understand clearly my conception of art," he wrote to Theo, "What I want and aim at is confoundedly difficult, and yet I do not think I aim too high. I want to do drawings which touch some people...In either figure or landscape I should wish to express, not sentimental melancholy, but serious sorrow...I want to progress so far that people will say of my work, he feels deeply, he feels tenderly - notwithstanding my so-called roughness, perhaps even because of it... What am I in most people's eyes? A nonentity, or an eccentric and disagreeable man- somebody who has no position in society and never will have, in short, the lowest of the low. Very well... then I should want my work to show what is in the heart of such an eccentric, of such a nobody." |
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"Painting Peasant life is a serious thing and I would reproach myself if I did not try to make pictures which will arouse serious thoughts." (Letter to Theo, 1885) "The figures in the pictures of the old masters do not work. To draw a peasant's figure in action . . . is the very core of modern art." |
In choice of subject matter we find many parallels between these two artists. Johnson prefers to paint individuals engaged in some routine task which was a common sight in his youth. Perhaps because he is painting a memory which he feels must be preserved for future generations or because he places such value in manual labor, these images seem almost monuments to a people and a way of life that are now past. Van Gogh seems to have had a very similar view of 'mundane' tasks and their performers. |
Both of these artists chose to load their canvases with heavy applications of oil paint. It is a shame that one must view any painting through a 2-D media but paintings as heavily textured as Van Gogh's and Johnson's seem to suffer more from the translation. These paintings are not meant to be merely viewed by the observer but felt as well. To touch a Johnson and feel it's bumps and globs and hatchy strokes is half of the wonder of the experience. We can not boast the same experience with a Van Gogh having access to his work only in museums with edgy guards in attendance. However, with an application of oil paint as heavy as Van Gogh describes in this next excerpt, one can imagine the experience not unlike that of a low-relief sculpture. |
"While painting it I said to myself, I must not go away before there is something of an autumn evening in it, something mysterious, something serious. But as this effect does not last, I had to paint quickly. The figures were put in at once with a few strong strokes of a firm brush. It struck me how sturdily those little stems were rooted in the ground. I began painting, them with a brush, but because the surface as already so heavily covered, a brush stroke was lost in it - then I squeezed the roots and trunks in from the tube, and modeled it a little with the brush. Yes-now they stand there rising from the ground, strongly rooted in it... In a certain way I am glad that I have not learned painting, because then I might have learned to pass by such effects as this." |
| It is true that Vincent taught himself to paint
but not for lack of teachers or exposure to others' techniques. Vincent
schooled himself to a four year rigorous routine of drawing from life and
old master's prints before venturing forth from his self-imposed isolation
"What is drawing?" he asked in a letter. "It is working oneself through an invisible iron wall that seems to stand between what one feels and what one can do." |
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When he felt he was ready Van Gogh exposed himself to the teachings of other artists with the same relentless zeal he did everything else. He enrolled in art schools, attached himself to mentors, and hung out with the impressionists in Paris. Each activity lasted only a few months as his very strongly voiced opinions tended to alienate him from others even as his enthusiasm waned. One by one his teachers and friends tumbled down from the ivory towers to which he had exalted them. |
| Nevertheless, this exposure had a profound
impact on his technique, his choice of color, and his view of himself as
an artist.
"it is actually one's duty to paint the rich and magnificent aspects of nature." wrote Vincent. "We are in need of gaiety and happiness, of hope and love. The more ugly, old, vicious, ill, poor I get, the more I want to take my revenge by producing a brilliant color, well arranged, resplendent." |
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"I hit the canvas with irregular touches of the brush, which I leave as they are. Patches of thickly laid-on color, spots of canvas left uncovered, here and there with portions that are left absolutely unfinished, repetitions, savageries." |
"Working directly on the spot all the time,
I try to grasp what is essential in the drawing - later I fill in the spaces
that are bounded by contours- either expressed or not, but in any case
felt- with tones that are also simplified, by which I mean that all that
is going to be soil will share the same violet-like tone, that the whole
sky will have a blue tint."
It is this style of painting, brightly colored,(Gauguin) applied in dabs and choppy strokes,(Seurat) simplification of forms, and a strong use of line (Lautrec) for which he remains famous today. It is through this technique that he was finally able to freely express his emotions, which were in his case - incredible. |
| "I do not intend to spare myself, nor to avoid emotions or difficulties-I don't care much whether I live a longer or shorter time. . . The world concerns me only insofar as I feel a certain indebtedness and duty toward it because I have walked this earth for thirty years, and, out of gratitude, want to leave some souvenir in the shape of drawings or pictures-not made to please a certain taste in art, but to express a sincere human feeling." Vincent Van Gogh |
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