The Letters of Vincent Van Gogh (Penguin Classics)

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The letters can be read as an autobiography of an artist; time spent in Brabant, Paris and London, The Hague, Drenthe, Nuenen, Antwerp, Arles, Saint-Remy and Auvers chronicle his corporal travels as well as his artistic growth. His letters from Arles describe his utopian dream of establishing a community of artists who lived together, worked together, and helped each other.

He signed his paintings with ‘Vincent’, because French people had difficulty pronouncing ‘Van Gogh’. They succeed in enlivening the aesthetic emotion when contemplating Van Gogh’s very dazzling and unforgettable works. At some point, the constant practice of his craft would have allowed him to paint pictures that would sell.

Art is something which, though produced by human hands, is not wrought by hands alone, but wells up from a deeper source, from a man's soul. He has been responsible for numerous exhibitions, including the 1990 Vincent Van Gough centennial retrospective. Edited by Leo Jansen, Hans Luijten and Nienke Bakker The letters are the window to Van Gogh's universe. Anybody looking for a book on the “craft of writing” … believe it or not, this book is top dog for that. In the letters Vincent reflects different facets of his personality and he adopts a tone specific to his circumstances.

Whatever the reason is, I enjoyed viewing them and forming my own interpretations, even though my idea of the painting vastly contradicted the idea of its author. Not only do they throw light on Van Gogh’s own complex and intriguing character, they enlighten the whole creative process as seen through his eyes.At the time he went through a stage of religious fanaticism, his letters fully reflect his thoughts; at the time he was involved with Sien Hoornik his letters reflect his feelings.

However, sometimes I wonder what might has been, because by the end of his life, his skill as an artist was starting to become known among the critics. The way he described experiencing and coming to terms with his condition also sounded surprisingly contemporary to me. I learned through almost countless correspondences that he was rarely given the respect he felt he deserved, and he had just terrible luck with women. In just over a decade, he produced more than 2,100 artworks, including around 860 oil paintings and more than 1,300 watercolours, drawings, sketches and prints.I enjoyed reading Van Gogh's description of his images and later looking at images of the painting in another book.

Hughes closes and essay saying that Van Gogh was a great painter in spite of his madness, not because of it - and having read his letters, I'm inclined to agree. Despite the fact that his life was cut short far too early, he left behind the rich legacy of many deeply emotive paintings and these poignant letters. A nonentity, or an oddity, or a disagreeable man, someone neither has nor ever will have any place in society. The heart of man is very much like the sea, it has its storms, it has its tides and in its depths it has its pearls too.Colour notations: ‘blanc’ (white) (upper left and right); ‘blanc’ (white) and ‘vert’ (green) (on the shawl); ‘rose’ (pink) (on the dress); ‘vert’ (green) (on the table), letter 879. On the contrary as his own words say "what am I, but a friend of nature, of study, of work, and above all, of man. would immediately see through him, but instead as a true friend of mine, a man who loved artists and people above art, saw the world in its beauty and splendor in shades, light and types of paint.