Portraits of Van Gogh as an important genre in the artist's work

Portraits of Van Gogh occupy a prominent place in the history of world painting. Their significant part was written in the 1880s and 1890s, that is, just at the time when the famous artist experienced a very contradictory period of creativity: on the one hand, these were decades of rapid upsurge, and on the other hand, he experienced a most complicated depression, Which affected his writing style.

Features of creativity

Portraits of Van Gogh should be considered in the context of the main features of his becoming an artist. His style is very ambiguous and still serves as a subject of serious controversy. But the originality of his letter is beyond doubt. Many art critics agree that the great influence on him had a period of Impressionism. And in fact, the author himself when writing the canvases adhered to the principle of the necessity of depicting first of all the inner world and complex psychological experiences. This determined the manner and style of his writing: some uneven lines, blurriness of colors, play with colors, lack of proportionality in the composition. This clearly affects the influence of the Impressionists.

Differences from impressionists

However, if the latter primarily paid attention to the emotional component, the portraits of Van Gogh differ in depth and even some drama. In this respect, he is not at all like Impressionists, who tried to capture only their fleeting impressions of what they saw, while Van Gogh sought to explore the personality and its inner world. The artist himself considered one of his main creative principles to be the need to depict and reproduce the soul of a person, his essence and the main character traits. Thus, the portraits of Van Gogh not so much convey the impression of what they saw, how much they disclose the deep essence of the depicted people.

Features of portraits

The artist considered portrait painting one of the main in his work. A feature of his works in this genre is that he mostly chose as models of very simple people and sought to convey their complex inner world. He also paid special attention to the image of human suffering, experiences. Therefore, his images of people are extremely serious and even some dramatic.

Some works

Portraits of Van Gogh with a description are very important for understanding the worldview of this famous artist. For example, the picture "Portrait of Dr. Gachet" is written in a rather melancholy spirit. The author conveyed the difficult state of his hero, who is in heavy reflections, which is especially noticeable against the contrast of a bright blue background with his dejected expression on his face. The work of Van Gogh with the name expressively conveys the idea of their author. The canvas "The Burning Old Man" is a striking example of his work devoted to human suffering. This topic, as already mentioned above, was one of the main places in his work. In addition, the author attached special importance to the image of ordinary people. Thus, his painting "A peasant with a pipe" especially faithfully conveys his psychology of a simple worker.

Female images also occupy an important place in his portrait painting. For example, the painting "Arlesian" depicts a light image of a woman on a beige background, which emphasizes her calm and peaceful state of mind. Particularly interesting is the painting "Portrait of a young girl on the background of a bread field." In the series of the above works, this picture attracts attention by the fact that the figure of the girl is written out against the backdrop of the landscape, which shades her beautiful appearance, and, most importantly, emphasizes spiritual facial features.

Self-portraits

In conclusion, we should briefly say about the artist's image of himself. He has a whole series of self-portraits that make it possible to better follow the path of his becoming a master. In addition to paintings without titles, it is necessary to mention such paintings as "Self-portrait with a bandaged ear" and "Self-portrait in a straw hat". In these paintings, the artist appears as a complex personality with a difficult fate. This is especially noticeable in his face and expression. Finally, the composition itself and the background were chosen by Van Gogh so as to further emphasize one's own psychology and inner world. The artist himself wrote that he sought to understand the depth of his experiences and therefore sought a special piercing in the image of the features. Portraits of Van Gogh, photo with the names of which are presented in this article, this is proved.

Criticism and recognition

Indicative is the fact that the recognition of the artist came after his death. In life, he was not immediately recognized and appreciated. However, some of his contemporaries recognized his talent and helped him in every possible way. However, most critics were negative about not observing the rules of proportions, unusually depicting their figures, too boldly working with colors. But already in the 20th century his canvases became recognized masterpieces and diverge from hammers for huge sums.