Van Gogh paintings: names and descriptions

The short life of this artist was like a bright flash of lightning. Vincent Van Gogh lived only 37 years, but left behind a fantastically huge creative legacy: more than 1700 works, including about 900 drawings and 800 paintings. Paintings by Van Gogh at modern auctions beat all records by value, and in fact during his lifetime he managed to sell only one of his work, which in terms of today's money earned him an income of only $ 80. Contradictory emotional personality of the artist and his unusual creativity were incomprehensible to most contemporaries.

Now a lot of books are written about the biography of the famous Dutchman, and his paintings and drawings occupy pride of place in the most prestigious art museums and galleries of the world. Let's remember the creative way of the great expressionist and magnificent, not similar to any other, paintings of Van Gogh.

Three creative periods in the artist's life

The creative path of Vincent Van Gogh is conventionally divided by art historians into three periods: Dutch (1881-1886), Parisian (1886-1888) and later, which lasted approximately from 1888 until the death of the artist in 1890. Here is such a short creative life, the length of just 9 years, was destined for this man. Cloths written in these time intervals are very different from each other and the subjects, and the manner of writing. I want to clarify that the paintings of Van Gogh, whose names are mentioned in this article, of course, are only a small part of his enormous artistic heritage.

Vincent Van Gogh began to engage in creativity much earlier than 1881, but then he was mainly attracted to the graphic drawing. He did not receive professional art education, although he tried several times to study as an artist. But he could not overcome the rebellious spirit, his talent could not fit into any academic framework, which forced young Vincent to drop out of school and paint independently.

Pictures of the Wag Gogh of the Dutch period

Having discovered oil painting, the artist first of all began to write people, their harsh life, hard life. The canvases of this period are not at all similar to the vivid and beautiful creations of Van Gogh, which subsequently brought him deafening posthumous fame. Here are the characteristic works of those years: "Consumers of potatoes", "Weaver", "Peasant". The color palette of these paintings is dark and gloomy, like the very life of poor people.

It can be seen how the artist warmly empathizes with his characters. Van Gogh had a very responsive, kind and compassionate soul. In addition, he was very religious, for some time even served as a Christian preacher. All the commandments of the New Testament he understood literally. He walked in the simplest clothes, scantily fed and lived in the poorest huts. At the same time he came from a very wealthy family and if he wanted to, he could continue the family business (painting and art). But this was not Vincent Van Gogh, he could write pictures well, but did not sell.

Paris Period

In 1886, Van Gogh left his native Holland for ever and came to Paris, where he tried to study painting, visited exhibitions of fashionable painters, got acquainted with the work of the Impressionists. Pictures of Toulouse Lautrec, Monet, Pizarro, Signac, Renoir made a huge impression on Van Gogh and had a considerable influence on the further development of his creative manner of writing. Van Gogh begins to pay much attention to color, now it is attracted not only by people, but also landscapes and still lifes. The palette of the artist becomes brighter and brighter, in the works of the Paris period Van Gogh's talent as a beautiful colorist begins to manifest itself.

In Paris, the artist works as an obsessive, however, as always. Here are some typical paintings of Vag Gogh written at this time: "The Sea in St. Mary", "The Bouquet of Flowers in a Blue Vase", "The Seine Embankment with Boats", "The Still Life with Roses and Sunflowers", "The Branch of Blooming Almond", " The Cities in Montmartre, The Roofs of Paris, The Portrait of a Woman in Blue, etc. The Paris period of Van Gogh was very fruitful, in those years the artist painted about 250 paintings. Then Van Gogh gets acquainted with Gauguin, their friendship and creative union becomes very valuable for him. But the characters of the two creators are too different. And it all ends in a quarrel, which leads Vincent to a nervous breakdown. It is to this difficult period of his life that Van Gogh's painting "Self-portrait with a cut ear and tube" applies.

Creativity of Van Gogh in Arly

Gradually noisy Paris begins to weigh Van Gogh, and in the winter of 1888 he goes to Provence, in the town of Arles. Here he had to write his most ingenious creations. The beautiful nature of these places fascinates the artist. One by one he creates such paintings as "Landscape with a road, a cypress and a star," "Stocks in Provence", "Red vineyards", "Olive trees against the background of Alpilles", "Harvest", "Field of poppies", "Mountains in Saint-Remy "," Cypress "and many other unparalleled landscapes - masterpieces of post-impressionistic painting.

And he writes endless series of still lifes. No one has ever painted flowers the way Vincent Van Gogh did. Pictures - the famous "Sunflowers" and "Irises" - were written by him in Provence. The artist brings to the canvas the endless fields of Provence, filled with clear clear air, flowering gardens, cypresses, luxurious olive groves. At the same time, he is also an excellent portraitist. In Arles, they were written many portraits and self-portraits.

Famous "Sunflowers"

Still Life "Sunflowers" is one of the most popular paintings by Van Gogh. For most of us this canvas is known from numerous reproductions. Meanwhile, the Impressionist was written not only this still life, but a whole cycle of seven paintings, which depicted the sun flowers. But one of the works was killed in Japan with atomic bombing, the other was lost in one of the private collections. Thus, to the present day only 5 paintings from this series have reached.

These are the paintings of Van Gogh. The description and the photo of the reproduction, of course, can not convey the entire charm of the original. And still you want to devote "Sunflowers" a couple more lines. This still life just splashes with sunlight! Van Gogh surpassed himself, finding in the yellow color a lot of shades. Some researchers believe that this work showed the artist's mental illness, as evidenced by this unusual brightness and saturation of the still life.

Picture "Starry Night"

Painting of Van Gogh "Night", or rather, "Starry Night", was written by him in Saint-Rémy, in 1889. This is a large canvas with a size of 73x92 cm. The color scheme of this fantastic creation of the artist is very unusual - a combination of blue, heavenly, dark blue and green colors with various shades of yellow.

The compositional basis is the dark cypresses in the foreground, in the valley lies a small imperceptible town, and above it stretches an endless restless sky with exaggeratedly huge stars and a glowing moon, as if twirled in the whirlwind of the Milky Way. This picture, like most of Van Gogh's works, needs to be looked at, moving a good distance, it is impossible to perceive disparate large strokes in the vicinity.

Cloth "Church in the Over"

The painting by Van Gogh "The Church in the Over" is also one of the most famous and popular of his works. This work was written in the last year of the painter's life, when he was already very sick. Van Gogh suffered a severe mental disorder, which could not but affect his painting.

The figure of the church, which is the center of the composition, is made by wavy, quivering lines. The sky is heavy, dark blue, as if hanging over the church and pressing on it with its leaden weight. It is associated with the viewer with some imminent threat, awakens anxious feelings in his soul. The lower part of the picture is bright, it shows a forked path and grass, illuminated by the sun.

Cost of pictures

As mentioned earlier, the cost of the Dutch post-impressionist works is very high. But even possessing a huge amount of money, it is difficult to buy a canvas, the author of which is the great Van Gogh. Pictures with the names "Sunflowers" at the moment can be estimated at any mega-large sum. In 1987, one of the paintings of this cycle at the auction "Christie" was sold for 40.5 million dollars. Since then, a lot of time has passed, and therefore the cost of this work could grow many times.

The picture "Arlesian" left the auction "Christie" in 2006 for 40.3 million, and "Peasant in a straw hat" was bought in 1997 for 47 million dollars. If the artist could live up to our days, he would have been one of the richest people on earth, but he died in poverty, without even knowing how expensive the future generations will value his creativity.

The artworks in Russia

In Russia, paintings by Van Gogh can be seen in St. Petersburg, the Hermitage, as well as in Moscow, the Museum of Fine Arts. Pushkin. In total, there are 14 works by Van Gogh in our country: "Arena Arena", "Huts", "Morning", "Landscape with a house and plowman", "Portrait of Mrs. Trabyuk", "Boats in Saint Marie", "White House at Night, Arles Ladies, Bush, Walk of Prisoners, Portrait of Dr. Felix Rhea, Red Vineyards in Arles, Landscape in the Over after Rain.