The Life And Death Of Vincent Van Gogh

His whole approach to art was that the world is an angry and mean place – and that art, like religion, was there to console those who were heartbroken by life. And that was first and foremost him. He was first in line. To his contemporaries he was a lowly figure, to be avoided or mocked. He died largely unknown. Sometimes, I can relate to how he felt. Not so much now. But certainly most of the time at the beginning of this new century.  He too had a problem with drinking.

60 Minutes aired a great piece about Vincent van Gogh, my favorite master painter of the past. The main thrust of the segment was a new theory surrounding the circumstances of his death – historically presented as suicide. A biography postulates that Vincent did not shoot himself, but was in fact shot by some reckless youths. The main arguments were the fact that the suicide wound was in the stomach, that firearms were actually hard to come by in that day and location, and that one of the youths apparently admitted the incident to confidants…but their is much more in the story. You can veiw part 1 here:

and part 2 here

and finally an extra segment available only online that I really like that marries van Gogh’s words with his paintings.