Abstract
Vincent van Gogh is one of the most well-known and influential artists in the western tradition. A sociological analysis of his creative practice, therefore, not only illuminates particularly consequential interventions in the history of art, with its knock-on effects for cultural consumption, but affords an opportunity for deepening our understanding of cultural production per se. At stake, I argue, is a fundamental artistic disposition – in this case, an aesthetic orientation toward nature and sentiment – persisting through, if not underpinning, changes of style. This article reconstructs the myriad forces involved in the genesis of this disposition in van Gogh’s early years. It draws upon the conceptual tools of Pierre Bourdieu to do so, but goes beyond them by stressing the importance of familial heritage and ‘second order’ field effects in shaping the young van Gogh’s aesthetic sympathies, long before he briefly entered the French artistic field in his final year of life.
Highlights
Vincent van Gogh is possibly the most famous of ‘modern’ western artists
Whatever the socio-historical reasons for his posthumous fame, he is widely regarded within the art world as a fundamental spur for the emergence and flourishing of post-Impressionism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and commands wide recognition and appreciation across an extensive span of the population
The major task in this case is to unravel the production of van Gogh’s unwavering dedication to depicting nature and its workers – fields, trees, groves and agricultural labourers – and subordinating accuracy and technique in artworks to feeling. His precise style underwent considerable mutation over time, from the dark and sombre hues of his early works through the colour-filled quasi-pointillist experiments picked up from contact with post-Impressionist painters in France, to the expressive impasto of his later paintings. His double orientation formed a unifying thread from his earliest sketches and first major tableau (The Potato Eaters) to his later renderings of sunflowers, cypresses, cornfields, shepherds, reapers and sowers in Arles, but it underpinned his sympathy for, and appropriations from, specific artists and movements, including Impressionism
Summary
Vincent van Gogh is possibly the most famous of ‘modern’ western artists. His artworks are identifiable and sell for record-breaking prices, taking pride of place in galleries and private collections around the globe. The major task in this case is to unravel the production of van Gogh’s unwavering dedication to depicting nature and its workers – fields, trees, groves and agricultural labourers – and subordinating accuracy and technique in artworks to feeling His precise style underwent considerable mutation over time, from the dark and sombre hues of his early works through the colour-filled quasi-pointillist experiments picked up from contact with post-Impressionist painters in France, to the expressive impasto of his later paintings. His double orientation formed a unifying thread from his earliest sketches and first major tableau (The Potato Eaters) to his later renderings of sunflowers, cypresses, cornfields, shepherds, reapers and sowers in Arles, but it underpinned his sympathy for, and appropriations from, specific artists and movements, including Impressionism. Paint café scenes and portraits at various points too, but these were extensions of his focus on ‘the people’ and their everyday lives, are less numerous than his paintings of rural scenes and contrast with the consistent interest in castles, city scenes and urban life among the Impressionists and other post-Impressionists like Claude Monet, Edgar Degas, Georges Seurat or Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec
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