Well?
In reality it was only the lower half of his ear, it can probably be attributed to mental illness and alcohol, he tried to commit suicide a few times as well.
Multiple explainations can be found here.
The latest theory (as covered by NPR last year) was that he lost his ear in a sword fighting duel, but he was too hopped up on booze and/or drugs to remember so the guy that chopped it off told Van Gogh that he did it to himself. I’ll post a link to the story if I can find one.
Pardon?
We can’t know for certain what drove Van Gogh to do what he did, but persons suffering from schizophrenia often believe they hear voices, and in some extreme cases, such persons will resort to desperate measures, including tearing or cutting off their own ears, in vain attempts to silence these voices.
So, it’s conceivable that Van Gogh also suffered from schizophrenia or some similar mental illness, and was driven by similar motives.
Okay. This is how I learned it in college art history. It may or may not be true, though, seeing as there’s so many stories, so take it with a grain of salt.
Van Gogh worked with painter Paul Gaugin for a time. Unfortunately though, they didn’t get along very well. Conflict of interests, I guess. They got in a particularly bad fight one day, which ended with Gaugin storming off. Van Gogh was already having some serious mental issues at this time. He was depressed and probably schizophrenic, as he sometimes heard voices, and might have had some lead poisoning from constant contact with and possible ingestion of his oil paints. Anyway, he was so upset that for some reason he decided that he’d cut off part of his ear. He didn’t cut the whole thing off, just the lobe. He put the severed part in a little box and gave it to a hooker at one of the brothels that Gaugin was known to frequent, with a little note that said, “I’m not listening.”
I got a most wonderful book on Van Gogh as a Christmas present this year. It is a very large and beautiful book, and although full of brilliantly reproduced pictures of his paintings, it’s really a biography. The author is D.M. Field. This is his account of what happened that day:
"On 23 December it was still raining. The atmosphere in the Yellow House hummed with tension as Vincent worked on a painting of Mme. Roulin with her baby. A mother-and-child subject always upset Vincent, remembering Sien and little Willem. They (Gauguin and Van Gogh) had supper, and afterwards Gauguin went off for a walk by himself to escape the oppressive atmosphere of the house. He was crossing the Place Victor Hugo when he heard footsteps coming up rapidly behind him. As he turned, Vincent rushed towards him brandishing a cut-throat razor. Gauguin, so he tells us, stood his ground and glared, which made Vincent stop and, dropping his head, he set off at a run in the direction he had come. Gauguin went straight to a hotel and booked in for the night, though he did not get much sleep.
"Van Gogh’s movements are not entirely clear. It seems that he ran back the the Yellow House and then, or possibly later in the evening after a bout of heavy drinking, sliced off the lower part of his left ear with the razor. At 11:30 he appeared at the Maison de Tolerance No. 1 and asked for a girl called Rachel. She was presumably the prostitute with whom he had established some kind of a relationship, although that seems to have been no more than any regular customer might have expected. He presented her with his ear, wrapped in newspaper, and disappeared. Rachel’s reaction may be imagined. The police were called, the ear was taken into custody, and having established the identity of its owner, the police arrived at the Yellow House early the next morning, Christmas eve. They found bloody towels all over the floor and upstairs, a body unmoving in a bed with blood all over the bedclothers.
“At about that point Gauguin arrived. Seeing a crowd around the house, he hurried forward, to be confronted by a police officer. ‘What have you done to your comrade, monsieur?’ It was soon ascertained that Vincent was not dead but merely sleeping or unconscious, and having convinced the police that he had nothing to do with it, Gauguin was allowed to leave. He asked them to tell Vincent, when he awoke, that he had left for Paris, as he was afraid the mere sight of himself might be enough to kill him. Then he went to telegraph Theo (Vincent’s brother).”
Van Gogh was hospitalized for a short period of time following this episode.
A slight hijack, if I may: Many people are completely unaware of just how intelligent, articulate and aware Van Gogh truly was. He spoke several languages and wrote beautifully and cogently on a wide variety of subjects. Many of his letters to his brother Theo and other family members can be found on a site that is devoted to him. It can be found here:
Scroll down to the “Gallery” section and click on “The Complete Letters” link.
Thanks for the mention, Starvers. I don’t have an artistic bone in my body, but I like Van Gogh’s stuff. Between the two of you, Zoe and you have solved my birthday present dilemma. I trust Field’s tome is suitably expensive!
Probably not for a man of your means.
As it was a gift there was no price sticker on it, but I’d guess it’s probably in the $30 range.
The name is simply “Van Gogh.” I think you and the person you’re getting it for will enjoy it tremendously.
Regards,
“Starvers”
Splendid! Actually, I was not very clear. This solves my dilemma when my wife asks me “What would you like for your birthday, Pumpkin?”, or words to that effect. I am a man of means by no means, but she is a woman of substance.
Over a decade ago, A&E (when the A stood for Arts) broadcast a one-man show on Leonard Nimoy as Theo- in this I learned that Vincent has been a C’tian mission evangelist to poor mining communities, but his emotional over-involvement with his people led to his dismissal by the church authorities.
I guess you’ve seen the film about Van Gogh with Kirk Douglas and Anthony Quinn. I read somewhere that they used real Van Goghs. Nice film, anyhow.
FriarTed, that’s right. Vincent (this seems to be how those in the know refer to him) was strongly religious in early adulthood and spent many years pursuing what he felt was a theological calling.
roger, thanks for clearing that up. I had wondered since you alluded to liking Van Gogh yourself, and I even typed up a question asking if it were Zoe and I who were to get the book for you, but I omitted it as I came to feel that as an attempt at humor it was rather lacking in, uh, humor.
And yes, I’ve seen the film you mentioned but it was when I was in San Diego in 1968. My memories of it are vague, to say the least. The only scene I really remember is when Van Gogh cut his ear. I don’t think that is so much because of the gruesomeness of the act as it is due to the music and Douglas’ intense portrayal of the moment.
I’d love to see that movie again. I’ll have to look into it. Thanks for bringing it to mind.
Hey, man, you must have been completely spaced out. ‘68 - the year of the barricades, the year of the people, the year the dream died. Were you takin’ a break from the “Free Huey” protests in Oakland, or gearin’ up for the Democratic Party Convention in Chicago?
For those who might be interested, the film, directed by Vincente Minnelli, was Lust for Life.
Nope, nothing so interesting or colorful. I was in San Diego as a result of having joined the Navy Reserve. I had completed boot camp and was spending the required two weeks aboard ship before I returned home. On the ship, which was tied up alongside a tender and never put out to sea, we worked from 7:15 a.m. to 3:15 p.m. and then our time was our own till the next morning. Some of my buddies and I went to downtown San Diego to see what we could see. One of the things we saw was that movie.
We saw other things also, perhaps not of the same quality but very interesting nonetheless.
:: Starvers toddles off, the music from The Stripper playing in his head… ::
“In his enthusiasm he induced the painter Paul Gauguin, whom he had met earlier in Paris, to join him. After less than two months they began to have violent disagreements, culminating in a quarrel in which van Gogh wildly threatened Gauguin with a razor; the same night, in deep remorse, van Gogh cut off part of his own ear. For a time he was in a hospital at Arles. He then spent a year in the nearby asylum of Saint-Rémy, working between repeated spells of madness.”
Did Van Gogh have some kind of unrequited crush on Gaugin? Some of the things I’ve read about their relationship seem to hint at this. And some of Van Gogh’s actions seem easier to understand (though still odd) in this context.
I get a sense that Van Gogh was gay and loved Gaugin, but Gaugin was straight and didn’t return the sentiment. Any backup or rebuttal for this hunch? (And it is just a hunch.)
Yikes. Gauguin, I meant.
I couldn’t say whether Van Gogh was gay or not, but I’ve never heard anything that lead me to believe he was. He had several female lovers during his life and suffered deeply a couple of unrequited crushes on at two more women that I can think of. Plus, he was a somewhat regular customer of the local brothel and he and Gauguin both made allowances in their budgets for “hygiene” (trips to the brothel).
Van Gogh found it very difficult to get along with people for any length of time. He even had trouble when staying with his beloved brother. I imagine the difficulties he had with Gauguin were more likely the result of their being under the same roof 24-7. And Gauguin himself could be difficult to be around. He regarded himself a vastly superior painter to Van Gogh (and most everyone else) and had personality quirks of his own.
It’s my belief that Van Gogh simply had a great deal of admiration for Gauguin and his work and wanted very badly to both learn from him and impress him, and he just couldn’t handle the frustration when things didn’t turn out like he hoped.
Strinka
Because he was nutty as a fruitcake. I’ve loved his paintings since I was a kid. The art museum here in Philly has a few, and I could watch them for hours. While I’ve avoided studying his life out of fear that he won’t live up to my image of him, I’m convinced he was either schizophrenic, had chronic recurrent depression, or had some form of manic depression.
My guess (based almost entirely on looking at Sunflowers and View From The Asylum Window, for hours on end) it was a mixture of anger (for Gauguin <as a brother/father/mentor>, Theo, Rachel and the world for not accepting and loving him), despair (He felt that he’d failed at everything, and was wondering if was capable of success or deserving of being loved) and a cry for help (‘I’m broken inside. I cannot cope with this’)
BTW Prints almost entirely fail to convey Van Gogh’s paintings. His work had texture and literal depth.