Self-Portraits: Van Gogh and G
Self-Portraits: Van Gogh and Gauguin The pulsating relationship between Van Gogh and Gauguin during the fall of 1888 in Arles is well known, nevertheless Silverman reveals a complicated cultural and religious background of both painters that previously had not been explored. While concentrating on their principally different religious upbringings both artists emerge in startling new ways. At the core we find two opposing ways of using works of art for religious expression . Silverman challenges us to perhaps look beyond the personality clashes, opposing life styles, and metal illness that culminated their time in Arles and instead to their place in time amongst religion and modernism. Silverman introduces us to Gauguin by exposing his Roman Catholic education where he was taught the theology of the cross, the irrelevance of the material world and the importance to aspire to paradise. On the other hand she uncovers Van Gogh's contrasting upbringing from a humanistic Dutch theology. As both men attempted to identify with their personal history and struggled, as a result, their individual beliefs grounded them in very different institutions. Silverman writes in the introduction: "I was intrigued by how Gauguin may
However, the tone or theme of their subject matter is divided. Moreover, where Gauguin chooses to uses Greek classical elements, Van Gogh prefers paintings such as The Langlois Bridge (p. Where Gauguin constructs a Sunday afternoon with angels wrestling, Van Gogh paints the harvest or a landscape of grape vines. Van Gogh held a firm admiration for the physical reality of the natural world around him. bailing hay, milking cows or men working in the fields. the incommunicable), by contrast, Van Gogh attaches to the sacred by reaching out to nature and humanity. 71) a countryside bridge and waterway. Each chair embodies what Van Gogh sees as their differences. Van Gogh seeks to express divinity in common laborers, landscape, and flowers. Alternatively, Van Gogh focuses on the nature of the craft of everyday life; e. Their time in Arles was marked at first by mutual support and dialogue, however, there always was competition and friction between them. By analyzing their chosen visual forms Silverman unfolds the different cultural meanings and reveals how Van Gogh's theology of the natural world urged him to emphasize scenery, his environment, and people surrounded by nature. We see in many of Gauguin's labor that he rolls out the canvas compressing it while illustrating images of sin and virtue. While Gauguin tackles the sins of man, Van Gogh attempts a Zen-like technique, of which Silverman remarks is reminiscent of Japanese artists who made no distinction between the divine world and nature.
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Acceptance Essays
