Reading Van Gogh

[Hugo Zhang]

Kendrick,

"A jerk could be a true man as long as he has the courage to be true to himself."? A jerk is a jerk.

Jerk. (slang) a stupid or insignificant person.--Peerage Reference Dictionary

It's interesting to see how people put stickers on things or people they don't know. Van Gogh was a jerk in the eyes of people who saw him dressed in shabby clothes and painted a horse's ass in the street. He is a true man in my eyes when I read his letters and gaze at his paintings. Van Gogh is still the same Van Gogh, a jerk and and a true man in different eyes. Of course people can put many other stickers on him too.

From Letter 230

"I brought home many sketches that time, it was extraordinarily intriguing--but it may serve as an example of The Hague public's politeness toward painters that suddenly a fellow from behind me, or probably from a window, spat his quid of tobacco onto my paper. Well, one has trouble enough sometimes. But one need not to take it so very seriously; those people are not bad, they do not understand anything about it, and probably think I am a lunatic when they see me making a drawing with large hooks and crooks which don't mean anything to them.
Recently I have also been very busy drawing horses in the street. I would love to have a horse for a model sometime. Yesterday, for instance, I heard someone behind me say, That's a queer sort of painter--he draws the horse's ass instead of drawing it from the front. I rather liked that comment.
I love to make those sketches in the street, and as I wrote you in my last letter, I certainly want to reach a sort of perfection in it."

[Bill_1856]

Jerk. (slang) a stupid or insignificant person.--Peerage Reference Dictionary

I have found myself so often referring to people as "assholes," (particularly in traffic), that I was fearful that it would become an unfortunate habit in my ordinary speech pattern. Thus, I made the conscious effort to substitute the euphemism "jerk" for the more explicit term. Van Gogh was more than just a social misfit due to his mental disease, he was a jerk.

[chris jordan]

Bill, just remember that whenever you point your finger at others, labeling them assholes, jerks or whatever is your judgment of the day, there are four fingers pointed back at you. You might be interested to learn more about Picasso and Van Gogh; maybe they were "jerks" but they also offered the world something that carries some value. When you label them "jerks" and walk away, you miss the opportunity to understand what that was. They were both sincere and true men. How can someone be a a sincere and true man and a "jerk" at the same time? Something to ponder.

[paulr]

[QUOTE=chris jordanThey were both sincere and true men. How can someone be a a sincere and true man and a "jerk" at the same time? Something to ponder.[/QUOTE]

I think it's possible, even common. And I'm not saying this to pass judgment on Picasso or van Gogh or anyone else I don't know. Just some observations about people.

I see people who are true to themselves, to their beliefs, to their mission, to their work--in short, sincere and true men--who do not seem to care about anyone else. Or about the effect they have on anyone else. There are people who believe so much in the importance of what they're doing, that they exempt themselves from treating others well. They often cut a wide swath of misery and heartbreak as they move through the world. If we admire them for their accomplishments, then we are more likely to get away with this behavior. Sometimes we even admire them FOR this behavior. We like to romanticize the tyrannical genius. Maybe because secretly we wish we could get away with not giving a shit, too.

I don't think it's a stretch to call these people jerks. Doing so doesn't negate their accomplishments. Being a jerk doesn't make you less of a painter or writer. Getting an A+ in art doesn't stop you from failing in interpersonal relationships, and vice versa.

Perhaps the most important thing to notice is the counterexamples to the famous jerk-geniuses. History shows us that you don't have to mistreat people in order to follow your passions. I've met a small number of great writers and musicians and artists in my life, and have often been struck by their humility and kindness and generosity. Only some of them have been jerks. This tells me that if you pick a genius to emmulate, you do have a choice.

[Bill_1856]

Chris, I am well aware that it takes one to know one.

[chris jordan]

Very well said, Paul. There are many few world-class artists who break that mold of genius-jerk. Richard Misrach is one of them-- he's as humble and classy and decent as a person could be; an inspiring role model for anyone who aspires to acheive excellence in photographic art. The guitarist Pat Metheny is another-- not an egotistic bone in the man's body despite being one of the great musicians of his generation. And many of the poets I've run across seem to be like this too; there seems to be something about poetry that way. It's too bad about people like Picasso; I admire his work but definitely can't respect the way he behaved. In the end it dilutes the power of his work.

[Hugo Zhang]

I have covered some 400 pages of his letters so far. Maybe by the end of the 2,000 pages, I will understand why Bill thinks he was a jerk.

In his mid 20s, he went to a mining town as a missionary. This is how people remembered him:

"The family which had taken Vincent in had simple habits, and lived like working people.
But our evangelist very soon showed toward his lodgings the peculiar feelings which dominated him: he considered the accommodation far too luxurious; it shocked his Christian humility, he could not bear being lodged comfortably, in a way so different from that of the miners. Therefore he left these people who had surrounded him with sympathy and went to live in a little hovel. There he was all alone; he had no furniture, and people said he slept crouched down in a corner of the hearth.
Besides this, the clothes he wore outdoors reveals the originality of his aspirations; people saw him issue forth clad in an old soldier's tunic and a shabby cap, and he went about the village in this attire. The fine suits he had arrived in never reappeared; nor did he buy any new ones. It is true that he had only a modest salary, but it was sufficient to permit him to dress in accordance with his social position. Why had the boy changed this way?
Faced with the destitution he encountered on his visits, his pity had induced him to give away nearly all his clothes; his money had found its way into the hands of the poor, and one might say that he had kept nothing for himself. His religious sentiments were very ardent, and he wanted to obey the words of Jesus Christ to the letter.
He felt obliged to imitate the early Christians, to sacrifice all he could live without, and he wanted to be even more destitute than the majority of the miners to whom he preached the Gospel.
I must add that also his Dutch cleanliness was singularly abandoned; soap was banished as a wicked luxuary; and when our evangelist was not wholly covered with a layer of the coal dust, his face was usually dirtier than that of the miners. Exterior details did not trouble him; he was absorbed in his ideal of self-denial, but for the rest he showed that his attitude was not the consequence of laisser-aller, but a consistent practicing of the ideas governing his conscience.
He no longer felt any inducement to take care of his own well-being--his heart had been aroused by the sight of others' want.
He preferred to go to the unfortunate, the wounded, the sick, and always stayed with them a long time; he was willing to make any sacrifice to relieve their sufferings.
In addition, his profound sensitivity was not limited to the human race. Vincent van Gogh respected every creature's life, even of those most despised.
A repulsive caterpillar did not provoke his disgust; it was a living creature, and as such, deserved protection.
The family with whom he had boarded told me that every time he found a caterpillar on the ground in the garden, he carefully picked it up and took it to a tree. Apart from this trait, which perhaps will be considered insignificant or even foolish, I have retained the impression that Vincent van Gogh was actuated by a high ideal: self-forgetfulness and devotion to all other beings was the guiding principle which he accepted wholeheartedly.
He would squat in the mine fields and draw the women picking up pieces of coal and going away laden with heavy sacks.
It was observed that he did not reproduce the pretty things to which we are wont to attribute beauty.
He made some portraits of old women, but for the rest, nobody attached any importance to an activity that was considered a mere hobby.
But it would seem that such an artist, also, our young man had a predilection for all that seemed miserable to him.
These, sir, are a few reminiscences which my aged memory has tried to collect..."

A few years later, he wrote to his brother:

"Once I nursed for six weeks or two months a poor miserable miner who had been burned. I shared my food for a whole winter with a poor old man, and heaven knows what else, and now there is Sien(Sien is a sick and pregnant woman Van Gogh picked up from the street, uneducated with a face marred by smallpox, abandoned with a little girl, Hugo's note.). But so far I have never thought all this foolish or wrong. I think it so natural and right that I cannot understand people being so indifferent to each other in general. I must add that if I were wrong in doing this, you were also wrong in helping me so faithfully--it would be too absurd if this were wrong. I have always believed that "love thy neighbor as thyself" is no exaggeration, but a normal condition."

If this guy with a heart of pure gold was a jerk, who among us is not one?

[paulr]

a person's own letters (where he conveys his own image of himself, his own version of his deeds) might not be the most reliable place to find out what he was really like.

my letters express some pretty lofty intentions ... but if you want to find out if i'm a jerk, talk to my exes, or to my waiter from last night.

[Hugo Zhang]

Paulr,

I have just quoted other people's memories of van Gogh.

[Kendrick Pereira]

Hugo: Please remember, I did not call Vincent Van Gogh a jerk - but by implication you did.

What I did was ask you what you meant by your assertion that "A jerk could be a true man as long as he has the courage to be true to himself". That assertion was entirely yours, all of it. For myself, I reserve judgement as to whether Van Gogh was a jerk. The fact that I find him to be one of the most beguiling of all the nineteenth century painters - no, the most beguiling of them all - does not oblige me to assess his behaviour towards his fellow men as that of a decent man. If I do that - and I might - it would be on quite different grounds.

To be a great artist and give the world something that is of very great value as both Van Gogh and Picasso did, requires great talent and also great diligence but not decency of conduct towards other people, who are also entitled to consideration. You do not need to behave badly either, you can choose. There are many examples of artists whose conduct measured up very well. I don't mean that they were saintly but their standards stood comparision very well with that of their fellow men generally. I know of nothing particularly heinous against Manet, Monet or Renoir, for example: and consider Edgar Degas, who voluntarily dipped into his own pocket to help pay creditors when the business of another family member crashed. It was strictly speaking not Edgar's problem but his standards were such that he did not feel it would be honourable to wash his hands of it as, I am sure, most people in his position would today. Something to ponder? What would you do in that situation? I know what I would do and I honour his generosity. The worst I know of that anyone could say of Edgar Degas was that he was reserved and capable of being a bit brusque in his manner on occasion.