60 - Van Gogh
Hey there, ! Welcome to something...well, a little lighter :)
"How can I be useful, of what service can I be? There is something inside me, what can it be?" - Vincent Van Gogh
My name's Vincent. Nice to meet you.
Vincent's a pretty unique name. From a young age I knew I was different. Hell, the rest of my family's first name's start with S, and mine starts with V. What the hell, Mum?
Apparently I was supposed to be called Samson. Or Sunny. Which one do you reckon fits me better?
It's weird to think about what your name could have been, and the effect the one you got had on your life. I went to a private school when I was younger - though I only joined when I was in Grade 1. I missed all that core Prep bonding over smashed finger paints and fights in the schoolyard. I also missed the associated Toorak / Malvern upbringing, but that's beside the point.
I do remember when I was in Prep I got into a fight with some Year 1's on the oval and got in trouble (I thought I was top shit)...but I skipped out on detention because it was like the second-last day before I was leaving for a new school.
Ya boi's a rebel ;)
I remember being fascinated with anyone or anything that had the name Vincent. Throughout primary school, I was the only Vincent in the entire school. The whole time! We did have a teacher named Mr Vincent at school, and for the longest time I admired him from afar, thinking he would never get to know me, and being too chickenshit to introduce myself. I think he was the IT teacher, and the only interaction we ever had was in Grade 2. I was running straight at a blind corner as he slowly emerged, and rammed straight into him. I thought he'd know I was Vincent, laugh and be like 'oh my gosh I've been wanting to meet you all this time!'.
Oh young, naive Vince. He instead gave me a dressing down about running around corners. I guess it worked, since I remember it 20 years later?
In art class, we learnt about Vincent Van Gogh. An artist who could paint in a distinct, colourful style, and had a tortured backstory. Look at Starry Night - could you even think about drawing that? Or the rolling wheat fields and sunflowers, vibrant and yellow? We learned about his style, his life, his art...
...and after such a class, do you reckon the kids came away with an appreciation for beautiful, post-Impressionist works of art? Please. Such gruesomeness could not go unnoticed by kids. Thus...
"Why don't you go and cut your own ear off"
"Are you gonna go insane and live in an asylum"
"Crazy crazy Vincent"
If you think about it, it's actually pretty high-brow bullying. I mean, using Art History to bully is something on Hannah Gadsby levels of comedy.
What doesn't kill you makes you sad in the moment, but is hilarious to share on an email newsletter years later.
"I am seeking, I am striving, I am in it with all my heart." - Vincent Van Gogh
I went to the Van Gogh museum in Amsterdam a few years ago. Remember what travel was like? We tried to line up but found out that you had to make sure you had booked a ticket in advance, as the places were quite limited.
So we went the day after...and I could see why it was such hot property to get into.
The exhibition takes you through the early sketches and lithographs of Van Gogh - how he developed his colour theory and his travels through life. His letters to his brother Theodore gave an incredibly poignant view of his life - he was as great a writer as he was a talented painter. He writes of his troubles in finding his passion, his purpose, and working out who he wanted to be in the world.
But once he found it, he threw himself in 100%. It was a roaring fire of a passion that consumed him and didn't let him go.
One of the key things I learned while I was at that museum was how difficult he found exploring what he would be useful for in his life. It was something that I could relate to then, and I'm still struggling with today. He had been an art dealer and a missionary, but he always wanted to paint, to draw, to make something of himself and follow his passions wherever they led.
A luxury we don't always have these days...do we?
"Normality is a paved road: it's comfortable to walk, but no flowers grow there" - Vincent Van Gogh
You know how you read a book at different periods of your life, and the experience changes every time? You get older, you get wiser, and plucky teenage adventurers become irresponsible kids who don't know anything at all.
It was the same for me with Van Gogh's paintings, his letters, and his work.
Van Gogh came to Victoria a year or two ago. The exhibition was a collection of sketches I hadn't seen before, and ended with his rolling painting of the "Wheat Fields with Cypresses". It's like Starry Night, but a daylight, summer version of it. It was fascinating to think about the 2000 paintings in total that he produced in his life. What a legacy to leave behind.
One day, I'd love to go MoMA, in New York, and see Starry Night in person.
This time round I meditated on the actual struggles that Vincent went through in his life. He battled with his ideas around creativity, his lack of direction, his conflict with his passion, mental and physical illness, and the ever-present deadline of death. His letters to Theo grew more and more despondent as he thought he would never find his way, until he was able to focus on his passion and was consumed by painting, day and night, awake and in his dreams.
The struggle was enormous, but it resulted in momentous beauty. Was it worth it? Is there no beauty without struggle?
Those last two years of his life, the most productive of his life, were the steadily diminishing flames of a strongly burning candle. He had achieved a level of technical capability coupled with passionate will that helped him build his most famous pieces.
He'd never see how amazing he was, but his legacy lives on.
Wouldn't it be great to leave something behind as great as that?
Maybe one day I'll do the same.
“A great fire burns within me, but no one stops to warm themselves at it, and passers-by only see a wisp of smoke” - Vincent Van Gogh
Chat soon :)
✔️ Real Life Recommendations
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Van Gogh Museum - The next time you're in Amsterdam, feel free to skip the Rijksmuseum and go straight here. It's less crowded, and has all these wonderful works of art from Vincent Van Gogh. If you're going to the Musee d'Orsay in Paris, there are also a number of pieces there as well. Art is fascinating. I wish I had learnt more about appreciating it when I was younger.
The second best time to plant a tree is today, eh?
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Paint Plot - a website to order those paint-by-numbers paintings; I've bought some gifts from this and the designs are pretty fun! Don't think you'll be as good as Van Gogh but maybe something close to it...?
🚌 Adventures on the Information Super-Highway
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Postcard stamped in 1920 delivered 100 years later - what a headline! Getting something posted 100 years later; the audacity of the postal service! Fun short article :)
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When you browse Instagram and find former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott's passport number - this is a longread, but a hilarious read about how this guy was able to use a picture of a boarding pass on Instagram to find key details about Tony Abbott, culminating in finding his personal phone number. Most of the piece is about him trying to contact the government to tell them they fucked up. A great piece!
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The UX of Lego Interface panels - an offbeat piece about how Lego Interface panels have changed over time, and assessing the UX of various panels.