Why starry night was painted

Rodin, The Burghers of Calais. Van Gogh, The Starry Night. Gauguin, Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going?

Sullivan, Carson, Pirie, Scott Building. Picasso, Les Demoiselles d'Avignon. The first modern photograph? This is mainly due to the fact that he only mentions it in his letters to Theo twice Letters and , and then only in passing.

In his correspondence with his brother, Vincent would often discuss specific works in great detail, but not so in the case of Starry Night. It's difficult to say. Unlike most of Van Gogh's works, Starry Night was painted from memory and not outdoors as was Vincent's preference.

This may, in part, explain why the emotional impact of the work is so much more powerful than many of Van Gogh's other works from the same period.

Some people have made stylistic comparisons to Vincent's other well known and equally turbulent work Wheatfield with Crows. Does the tumultuous style of these works reflect a tortured mind? Or is there something more we can read within the whorls Vincent's raging night sky?

This is what makes Starry Night not only Vincent's most famous work, but also one of its most frequently interpreted in terms of its meaning and importance. Some people have speculated about the eleven stars in the painting.

While it's true that Vincent didn't have the same religious fervour in , when he painted the work, as he did in his earlier years, there is a possibility that the story of Joseph in the Old Testament may have had an influence on the composition of the work. Additional Commentary The interesting issue of Starry Night and its astronomical significance is discussed in detail on an Online Forum page. Oil on canvas Provenance Exhibitions. This too may be so; it is possible that premonitions of sufferings to come are articulated in the picture.

But Biblical allegory is present throughout van Gogh's oeuvre, and he had no need of a special motif, least of all a starry sky, with all its associations of Arles and Utopian visions. Rather, van Gogh was trying to summarize; and his resume juxtaposed natural, scientific, philosophical and personal elements.

Starry Night is an attempt to express a state of shock, and the cypresses, olive trees and mountains had acted as van Gogh's catalyst. More intensely, perhaps, than ever before, Van Gogh was interested in the material actuality of his motifs as much as in their symbolic dimensions.

There had been hills in Arles too, of course. But they entered his panoramic scenes as idyllic touches. His landscapes included the harvest, passing trains, isolated farmsteads and distant towns; and the hills were simply one more detail.

In Arles, Van Gogh's dream had been of the harmony of things and of the spatial dimensions in which that harmony could be felt. None of that remained. The hills rose up steep and abruptly now, menacing, threatening to drag the lonesome soul down into vertiginous depths.

The Starry Night has risen to the peak of artistic achievements. Although Van Gogh sold only one painting in his whole life, "Starry Night" is an icon of modern art, the Mona Lisa for our time. As Leonardo da Vinci evoked a Renaissance ideal of serenity and self-control, Van Gogh defined how we see our own age - wracked with solitude and uncertainty.

Although the series depicts various times of day and night and different weather conditions, all the works include the line of rolling hills in the distance. Explaining the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World are legendary sculptural and….

Wifredo Lam: The Imagination at Work. Twenty-four exemplary works acquired over the last two years from the Souls…. In a perfectly paired yin-yang juxtaposition of exhibitions, two artists—Ana…. This winter, in his first collaboration with a major UK gallery, American…. Chris Fallon: Irresistible Deception. The Life and Art of Edgar Degas.

Art Impressionism. Life After B. Haines Gallery Returns with Chromotherapy. McKnight Kauffer" at the Cooper Hewitt. The Life and Art of Michelangelo.