The Letters of Vincent van Gogh

by Vincent Van Gogh

(4) That it will not be remedied in a hurry. For the sake of appearances I have put matters straight by writing to Father again and telling him that I have rented a studio, that I wished him a happy New Year, and that I hoped we would have no more quarrels of this or any other kind in that New Year. I shall do no more about it, nor do I need to.

  If this last row had been an isolated case then it would be a different matter, but it was preceded by other rows, yet whenever I told Father a few things in a calmer though still resolute way, His Hon. would fling it all systematically to the winds. So as far as the things I have said in anger are concerned, I think the same even in a calmer mood, though for diplomatic reasons I have usually kept quiet about them or put them differently. But this time I lost my temper, my diplomacy went by the board, and well, for once I had my say. I offer no apology for that and while Father & Mother continue in this mood I shall take nothing back. Should they later behave in a more humane, more sensitive and more sincere way, then I shall be happy to take everything back. But I doubt if that will happen.

  (5) That Father & Mother cannot live while there is all this bickering going on, &c, that’s true, in so far as they are creating a desert around themselves and are earning themselves an unhappy old age when they could have a happy and contented one. But as to such expressions as ‘I cannot bear it’, ‘it’s killing me’, ‘my life is being embittered’, I no longer attach any importance to them, for that’s only their little way. And if they do not change, then, as I have already said, I’m afraid they are storing up many bad and lonely days for themselves.

  (6) That I shall be sorry, &c. Before things came to their present pass, I used to have many regrets and be very sad and reproach myself because things between Father and Mother and me were going so badly. But now that matters have gone this far, well, so be it, and to tell you the truth, I have no regrets any

  Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, 7 or 8 January 1882

  more, cannot help feeling a sense of deliverance. If I should later come to see that I did wrong, well, then I shall of course be sorry, but as it is I have been unable to see how else I could possibly have acted. When somebody tells me decisively, ‘Get out of my house, the sooner the better, in half an hour rather than an hour,’ well then, my dear fellow, it doesn’t take a quarter of an hour for me to leave, never to return either. That was going too far, and you surely understand that, if only to spare you and others further financial trouble, I should not lightly have left of my own accord, but once that ‘Get out’ has been said, by them and not by me, well then, my course is clear enough.

  (7) As for Mauve - yes indeed, I am very fond of M. and am in sympathy with him. I love his work - and I count myself fortunate to be learning from him, but I can no more withdraw into some system or school than Mauve can himself, and apart from Mauve and Mauve’s work, I also love others who are quite different and work quite differently. And as for myself and my own work, perhaps there is a similarity between us at times, but there is certainly a difference as well. If I love someone or something, then I do so in earnest and sometimes with real passion and fire, but that doesn’t make me think as a matter of course that only a few people are perfect and all the others worthless - far from it.

  (8) Freethinker, that is really a word I detest, although I have to use it occasionally faute de mieux.3 The fact is that I do my best to think things through and try in my actions to take account of reason and common sense. And trying to belittle someone would be quite contrary to that. So it is perfectly true that on occasion I have said to Father, ‘Do try to think this or that through,’ or, ‘To my mind, this or that does not stand up,’ but that is not trying to belittle someone. I am not Father’s enemy if I tell him the truth for a change, not even that time I lost my temper and did so in salty language. Only it did no good, and Father took it amiss.

  In case Father refers to my saying that, ever since I have acquired so much dessous les cartes,4 haven’t given two pins for the morality and the religious system of the clergy and their academic ideas, then I absolutely refuse to take that back, for I truly mean it. It is just that when I am in a calm mood, I don’t talk about it, although it is a different matter when they try to force me to go to church, for instance, or to attach importance to doing so, for then I naturally tell them that it is completely out of the question.

  (10) Does Father’s life count for nothing? I have already said that when I hear someone say, ‘You will be the death of me,’ while in the meantime that man is reading his paper and half a minute later is talking about goodness knows what advertisement or other, I consider that phrase fairly irrelevant and superfluous & take no notice of it. As soon as that kind of phrase is repeated to others, who are then going to consider me more or less a murderer or even a parricide, I say, these slanders are nothing more nor less than Jesuitisms. There you are. Anyway, the murderer has left the house now, and so, in short, I take not the slightest notice of any of it and even consider it ridiculous.

  (11) You say, ‘I don’t understand you.’ Well, I readily believe that, for writing is really a wretched way of explaining things to each other. And it takes up a great deal of time and you and I have a great deal to do as it is. But we must have a little patience with each other until we can see, and speak to each other.

  (12) Write to me again. Yes, of course, but first we must agree how. Would you like me to write in a kind of businesslike style, dry and formal, weighing my words carefully and actually saying nothing at all? Or would you like me to continue to write as I have done recently, telling you all the thoughts that come into my head, without being afraid of rambling on now and then, without censoring my thoughts or holding them back? That’s what I would prefer - that is, being free to write or say exactly what I mean.

  So much for my direct answer to your letter, but I still have some things to say to you about drawing, &c, &c, and I would sooner talk about that. Consider it a point in my favour that for the time being I am behaving as if Father and Mother did not exist. It would have been much better if I had spent this winter in Etten, and things would have been much easier for me, too, especially for financial reasons - if I were to start thinking & fretting about that again, it would make me melancholy, so that’s over and done with, once and for all. I am here now and I must try to muddle through. If I wrote to Father about it again, it would be adding fuel to the fire, I don’t ever want to get angry again and am throwing myself with might and main into life and affairs here, and, what can I do, Etten is lost and so is Heike, but I shall try to obtain something else in their stead.

  Let me now thank you warmly for what you sent me. I don’t need to add that I am still extremely anxious in spite of it. Of course my expenses are greater than in Etten and I cannot get down to work half as energetically as I should like and should be able to if I had greater resources.

  But my studio is turning out well. I wish you could see it sometime. I have hung up all my studies and you must send me back those you still have because they could still be useful to me. They may not be saleable and I readily acknowledge all their faults, but there is something of nature in them because they were done with some passion.

  And you know, I am toiling away at watercolours right now and when I have got my hand in, they will be saleable. But Theo, believe me, when I went to Mauve for the first time with my pen drawings and M. said, ‘Now try it with charcoal & crayon & brush & stump,’ I had the devil of a job working with that new material. I was patient, but that didn’t seem to help, then I grew so impatient at times that I would stamp on my charcoal and become utterly dejected. And yet, a little while later, I sent you drawings done with chalk & charcoal & the brush, and I went back to Mauve with a whole lot of similar ones, in which, naturally, he found something to criticize, and with reason, and you did as well, but still, it was a step forward.

  Now I am once again passing through a similar period of struggle and dejection, of patience and impatience, of hope and despair. But I have to struggle on and, well,
in good time I shall understand watercolours better. If it were easy, there would be no pleasure in it. And ditto, ditto with painting.

  Added to this, the weather is inclement so that I have yet to go out just for the fun of it this winter. Still, I am enjoying life, and in particular having a studio of my own is too glorious for words. When are you coming to have some tea or coffee with me? Soon, I hope. You can spend the night too, if necessary -how very nice and how enjoyable. And I even have some flowers too, a few small bowls of bulbs.

  And what’s more, I have obtained yet another ornament for my studio. I got an amazing bargain of splendid woodcuts from the Graphic, in part printed, not from the clich6s, but from the blocks themselves. Just what I’ve been looking for for years. Drawings by Herkomer, Frank Holl, Walker and others. I bought them from Blok the Jewish bookseller, and for five guilders picked the best from an enormous pile of Graphics & London News. They include some superb things, for instance, the Houseless and homeless5 by Fildes (poor people waiting outside a night shelter) and two large Herkomers and many small ones, and the Irish emigrants6 by Frank Holl and the ‘Old gate’7 by Walker, and above all a girls’ school by Frank Holl, and then another large Herkomer, The Invalids.

  Anyway, it’s just the stuff I need.

  And I keep such beautiful things at home with some contentment because, my dear fellow, although I am still a long way from doing anything as beautiful myself, I have nevertheless hung a few of my studies of old peasants, etc., on the wall, which proves that my enthusiasm for those artists is not mere vanity, but that I struggle and strive to make something myself that is realistic and yet done with feeling.

  I’ve got about 12 figures of diggers and people working in the potato field, and I wonder if I couldn’t do something with them. You still have a few of them, for instance a man putting potatoes into a sack. Well, I’m not sure when, but sooner or later I must get down to that, because last summer I made some careful observations, and here in the dunes I should be able to do a good study of the earth and the sky and then put in the figures boldly. Still, I’m not setting too much store by these studies, and hope, of course, to do something quite different and better, but the Brabant types are characteristic and who knows whether they can’t still be used to good account. If there are any you would like to keep, feel at liberty to do so, but I should be very glad to have back those in which you are not interested. By studying new models I will automatically discover the mistakes in proportion I made in last summer’s studies, and so they may yet prove useful to me.

  When your letter took so long to come (since it went to Mauve first, I received it even later) I had to go to Mr Tersteeg, and he gave me 2 5 guilders until I received your letter. It might be a good idea if I, with your knowledge, or you, with my knowledge, made some sort of an arrangement with Mr T. For you realize, Theo, I must know with as much certainty as possible what to expect, and I must be able to calculate and be able to tell in advance whether I can do this or that or must give it up. So you will do me a great favour by agreeing with me to a definite arrangement, and I hope you will write to me about it soon.

  Mauve has promised me to put my name forward immediately as an associate member of Pulchri,8 because I shall then be able to draw from the model there 2 evenings a week and shall have more contact with artists. Then as soon as possible after that I shall become a full member. Well, my dear fellow, thanks for what you sent, and believe me, with a handshake,

  Ever yours,

  Vincent

  From Mauve, Vincent learned the principles of painting in watercolours and in oil. Mauve was one of the leading members of the Hague School, a movement predominant in the Dutch art world at the time. Its painters excelled in atmospheric landscapes of the Dutch polders and the everyday lives of peasants and fishermen. Mauve specialized in the painting of cattle and, with Weissenbruch, he was the most brilliant watercolourist of the Hague School.

  Van Gogh benefited considerably from his lessons, but contact with the melancholy Mauve was not without its problems - the two artists sometimes got on each other’s nerves. ‘It isn’t always very easy for me to get on with Mauve, any more than the other way around, because I believe both of us are of an equally nervous disposition.’ Meanwhile, financial worries continued to plague Van Gogh. Sometimes he was ‘feverish with nervous exhaustion’ and did not know how he would get through the week. Luckily he was able to take advantage of the facilities of Pulchri Studio to do drawings from life. ‘Drawing is becoming more and more a passion with me, a passion just like that of the sailor for the sea.’ In addition, he found his models among the ‘orphan’ men and women, inhabitants of the Diaconessenhuis (a church-run almshouse and hospital), in the soup kitchens of The Hague, and - like Daumier before him - in third-class waiting rooms.

  He did not lack support from colleagues during this early Hague period. In George Hendrik Breitner, who was to become the leader of the so-called Amsterdam Impressionists a few years later, he met a colleague at the beginning of his career who, like himself, was interested in the portrayal of simple working types. Van Gogh had hopes that drawings of this kind might sell as designs for magazine illustrations. He also benefited from the advice of the landscape painter Jan Hendrik Weissenbruch, one of the most congenial members of the Hague School, and drew confidence from the latter’s appreciation of his pen drawings.

  Théophile de Bock lent him a book that made a great impression on him, namely Alfred Sensier’s biography of Jean-Françl;ois Millet. Van Gogh saw his own path as a painter of peasants sketched out in this biography, much as, a few years earlier, he had seen his preacher’s career mapped out in Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress: ‘It interests me so much that I am woken by it at night, light the lamp and carry on reading.’ Sensier’s biography of Millet was to remain Van Gogh’s manual of true art until the day he died, and strengthened him in his resolve to become a painter of peasant life.

  Vincent’s relationship with Herman Tersteeg, who ran the Hague branch of Goupil & Cie, remained difficult and equivocal. The importance he attached to Tersteeg’s opinion and sympathy is understandable, because Tersteeg wielded great influence in the art circles of his day. Vincent believed firmly that acceptance by him was the key to his breakthrough as an artist. It is true he made increasingly critical and indignant comments on Tersteeg’s character, but at the same time he continued to vie for his favours and to bear his opinions in mind, even when they ran counter to his own deepest convictions. Years later, writing from Aries, Van Gogh was still trying to convince this pope of the arts in The Hague of his qualities as an artist.

  Although Tersteeg bought one of his drawings, Van Gogh was deeply offended by such comments as, ‘It’s time you started to think about making a living.’ Van Gogh refused to act on the suggestion that he should paint easily saleable watercolours - he was not yet ready to do this and preferred Mauve’s advice to continue with his figure studies. He despised easy success: ‘Surely, the true path is to delve deep into nature.’

  Vincent refused to yield an inch when it came to matters of principle, even to his uncle, the art dealer Cornelis Marinus van Gogh, who called on him and gave him a commission to draw twelve views of The Hague. Thus when his uncle criticized the Belgian artist De Groux’s way of life in his presence, Van Gogh felt almost personally attacked: ‘It has always struck me that when an artist shows his work in public, he has the right to keep the inner conflicts of his private life (which is directly and fatally bound up with the peculiar difficulties involved in producing a work of art) to himself […].’

  The following letter conveys a good idea of the problems that exercised Van Gogh during his first period in The Hague. In it we also

  140 I Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, 3 March 1882

  find mention for the first time of Clasina (Sien) Hoornik and her family, whom Vincent had taken on as models and who seemed at that time still ‘splendidly willing’.

  178 [D]

  Friday 3 March [188
2]

  My dear Theo,

  Since I received your letter & the money, I have had a model every day and am up to my ears in work.

  I’ve a new model now, though I had done a hasty drawing of her once before. Or rather, there is more than one model, for I have already had 3 individuals from the same family, a woman of about 45 who is just like a figure by Ed. Frére, and her daughter, about 30, and a younger child of 10 or 12. They are poor people and, I must say, splendidly willing. I only managed to get them to agree to pose with some difficulty and on condition that I promise them regular work. Well, that was exactly what I wanted so badly myself, so I consider the deal a good one.

  The younger woman’s face isn’t beautiful, because she has had smallpox, but the figure is very graceful and I find it rather charming. They have the right clothes, too, black merino and a nice style in bonnets and a beautiful shawl, &c.

  You needn’t worry too much about the money because I reached an agreement with them at the beginning. I promised that I would give them a guilder a day as soon as I sold something. And that I shall make up then for paying too little now.

  But I simply must sell something. If I could afford to, I would keep everything that I am doing now for myself, since if I could just keep it for a year, I feel sure I would get more for it.

  But anyway, in the circumstances I should find it very gratifying if Mr Tersteeg did take something now and then, if necessary on condition that it will be exchanged if it isn’t sold. Mr Tersteeg has promised to come round to see me as soon as he can find the time.

  The reason I should like to keep them is simply this. When I draw individual figures, it is always with a view to a composition with more figures, for instance a 3rd-class waiting room, or a pawnshop, or an interior. But the larger compositions must mature gradually, and for a drawing with, let’s say, 3 seamstresses, one might have to draw 90 seamstresses. Voilaacute; l’affaire.1