I read all the letters Vincent wrote to his brother, not only the 100 compiled in that famous book. I have a deluxe edition of his letters. I think he is be best letter writer in the whole world. He was ahead of his time, as his paintings show. However, he was a sick man too. Starting with the religion indoctrination he had. He wanted to be like his father, but was rejected. He must have had something that made him impossible to deal with. Even Gaugin, who was paid by Theo to live with him got tired of him. Again, that is part of being an artist, a genius. Maybe his bipolarity made him do that, but he was a good man. Picasso was the best chicken feet painter. His father made him paint chicken feet when he was doing his own paintings. His father was a teacher at an academy for 18 year olds and older. One day Picasso's father asked the director of the academy if his son could study at the academy (Pablo was 12). They say, if he pass the screening, he can be here. They gave Pablo 2 months to do two painting. He painted them in one week. One was of a beautiful girls without shoes, the beauty of that painting does not envy to any of the masters of the renascence. The other one was of his father sick on a bed with a nurse by his side. Although, he finished in one week, he didn't tell his father because he was afraid that there was something wrong with them. After one month, he told his father, who took the paintings to the academy and it marveled the directors and other professors. He as accepted. By age 17 he had invented the Cubism, by age 19, he had invented the curvilinear cubism, and by age 21, he left for Paris. The story continues....., but there is no room here for that. He starved in Paris and he had to burn his own painting to deal with the cold in his rented room. He also had a brain, he married he daughter of a Russian general who had money and social position. That allowed him to move in high circles....etc. Back to Vincent. He is the master of struggle, he is the man who did not know how to draw, and still took painting. He learned to paint wit such enthusiasm, that one of his early paintings (The Potato Eaters) is a master piece and says more than anything, all the struggles and sufferings he had during his prior life. Hey, back to take photos of trees, to see if we can be like Sexton or Ansel Adams.