What was vincent van goghs first painting

He struggled with mental illness and remained poor and virtually unknown throughout his life. Van Gogh was born exactly one year after his parents' first son, also named Vincent, was stillborn. At a young age — with his name and birthdate already etched on his dead brother's headstone — van Gogh was melancholy. Theo van Gogh would later play an important role in his older brother's life as a confidant, supporter and art dealer. At age 15, van Gogh's family was struggling financially, and he was forced to leave school and go to work.

There, he fell in love with English culture. He visited art galleries in his spare time, and also became a fan of the writings of Charles Dickens and George Eliot. He also fell in love with his landlady's daughter, Eugenie Loyer. When she rejected his marriage proposal, van Gogh suffered a breakdown. He threw away all his books except for the Bible, and devoted his life to God. He became angry with people at work, telling customers not to buy the "worthless art," and was eventually fired.

Van Gogh then taught in a Methodist boys' school, and also preached to the congregation. Although raised in a religious family, it wasn't until this time that he seriously began to consider devoting his life to the church. Hoping to become a minister, he prepared to take the entrance exam to the School of Theology in Amsterdam.

After a year of studying diligently, he refused to take the Latin exams, calling Latin a "dead language" of poor people, and was subsequently denied entrance. The same thing happened at the Church of Belgium: In the winter of , van Gogh volunteered to move to an impoverished coal mine in the south of Belgium, a place where preachers were usually sent as punishment. He preached and ministered to the sick, and also drew pictures of the miners and their families, who called him "Christ of the Coal Mines.

The evangelical committees were not as pleased. They disagreed with van Gogh's lifestyle, which had begun to take on a tone of martyrdom. They refused to renew van Gogh's contract, and he was forced to find another occupation. In the fall of , van Gogh decided to move to Brussels and become an artist. Though he had no formal art training, his brother Theo offered to support van Gogh financially.

Van Gogh's art helped him stay emotionally balanced. In , he began work on what is considered to be his first masterpiece, "Potato Eaters. Nevertheless, van Gogh decided to move to Paris, and showed up at Theo's house uninvited. However, you must feel, as I do, that someone like that is on the way - Rodin? But the painter of the future will be a colourist the like of which has never yet been seen.

But I'm sure I am right to think that it will come in a later generation, and it is up to us to do all we can to encourage it, without question or complaint. Van Gogh only sold one painting during his lifetime The Red Vineyard. This painting sold in Brussels for Francs only a few months before his death. He practised drawing and frequently worked out of doors. He supported Vincent financially so he could focus entirely on his art.

Vincents parents, by contrast, were extremely disappointed that their eldest son had chosen the life of an artist, which in their eyes was synonymous with social failure.

It did not help that Vincent had fallen in love with his cousin, Kee Vos. Kee was a widow and wanted nothing to do with him, but Van Gogh persisted.

He found a new home in The Hague. Vincent took painting lessons in The Hague from a cousin by marriage, the celebrated artist Anton Mauve. Van Gogh felt his drawing technique was not yet good enough, so he also continued to practise fanatically.

Unable to successfully copy the style, he developed his own more bold and unconventional style. In , Van Gogh decided to go south to Arles where he hoped his friends would join him and help found a school of art. At The Yellow House , van Gogh hoped like-minded artists could create together. Gauguin did join him but with disastrous results. Near the end of , an incident led Gauguin to ultimately leave Arles.