Starry Night by Van Gogh

Starry Night by Vincent Van Gogh becomes more and more interesting to me everytime it is discussed. What is fascinating to me is that when he was a painter he was nothing, but now that he has come to past people consider his work as genius. One of the reasons why this peice has increasing interest for me everytime it is explored is becuase of Van Gogh himself. Put into context, he was a very poor, disturbed and depressed artist for his artistic career. Someone mentioned in class that he even ate his paints, which I didn't know before. In other words he was in a rut and somewhat desparate for the basic human necessities such as food. In earlier years of talking about this painting I learned that Van Gogh painted this while at an asylum in the 1880's. The painting includes a view of a vibrant night sky looming over a nestled village in the hills with a tall cypress tree to the left. With such a strong composition and vibrant use of color as well as Van Gogh's uniqueness it is not suprising that this peice has caught so many eyes.

There are so mnay strong elements, and that is another reason for talk and admiration in the artist world. First is his strong use of color. There is so much blue and darker cooler colors in this picture but Van Goghs use of accent colors as well as his placement of highlights (in the stars and moon and lower part of the sky) as well as his shadows (in the hills, a bit in the village and in the cypress tree) are quite complementary of one another and provide for a very pleasing aesthetic expereince. He also has a very strong use of texture. He has chopped brush strokes and thickly applied paint of various shades in one are. The texture is intriguing and creates almost a peaceful movement, often found at night. His use of line is well balanced with the horizontal skyline, and the verticle tree. The skyline is not boring however, but made interesting and full of motion with the swirls and curves. Space is done well with around 1/3 the painting being the village and land and 2/3rds the sky. The moon and the tree balance each other out as well as the stars sky are nicely spaced.

Overall Van Gogh is nothing less thank a very expressionistic painter. The peice is intriguing and so is Van Gogh as an artist.