Vincent : Lyrics

Starry, starry night
Paint your palette blue and gray
Look out on a summer's day
With eyes that know the darkness in my soul...
Shadows on the hills
Sketch the trees and the daffodils
Catch the breeze and the winter chills
In colors on the snowy linen land.

Now I understand
What you tried to say, to me
And how you suffered for your sanity
And how you tried to set them free:
They would not listen; they did not know how --
Perhaps they'll listen now.

Starry, starry night
Flaming flowers that brightly blaze
Swirling clouds in violet haze
Reflect in Vincent's eyes of china blue
Colors changing hue
Morning fields of amber grain
Weathered faces lined in pain
Are soothed beneath the artist's loving hand.

Now I understand
What you tried to say, to me
And how you suffered for your sanity
And how you tried to set them free:
They would not listen; they did not know how--
Perhaps they'll listen now.

For they could not love you
But still, your love was true
And when no hope was left inside
On that starry, starry night
You took your life as lovers often do--
But I could've told you, Vincent:
This world was never meant
For one as beautiful as you.

Starry, Starry night
Portraits hung in empty halls
Frameless heads on nameless walls
With eyes that watch the world and can't forget
Like the strangers that you've met
The ragged men in ragged clothes
The silver thorn, a bloody rose
Lie crushed and broken on the virgin snow.

Now I think I know

What you tried to say, to me
And how you suffered for your sanity
And how you tried to set them free:
They would not listen; they're not listening still--

Perhaps they never will.

Vincent van Gogh : Paintings

Vincent van Gogh : Famous Line

• Great things are not done by impulse, but by a series of small things brought together.
• Love is something eternal; the aspect may change, but not the essence.
• I can't work without a model. I won't say I turn my back on nature ruthlessly in order to turn a study into a picture, arranging the colors, enlarging and simplifying; but in the matter of form I am too afraid of departing from the possible and the true.
• It is not the language of painters but the language of nature which one should listen to the feeling for the things themselves, for reality, is more important than the feeling for pictures.
• I am not an adventurer by choice but by fate.
• I dream of painting and then I paint my dream.
• The best way to know God is to love many things.
• The more I think about it, the more I realize there is nothing more artistic that to love others.
• If one is master of one thing and understands one thing well, one has at the same time, insight into and understanding of many things.
• Conscience is a man's compass.
• If you hear a voice within you saying, ''You are not a painter,'' then by all means paint� and that voice will be silenced.
• There is no blue without yellow and without orange.
• A good picture is equivalent to a good deed
• If boyhood and youth are but vanity, must it not be our ambition to become men?
• Do not quench your inspiration and your imagination; do not become the slave of your model.
• What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything?
• Even the knowledge of my own fallibility cannot keep me from making mistakes. Only when I fall do I get up again.
• But I always think that the best way to know God is to love many things.
• Painting is a faith, and it imposes the duty to disregard public opinion.
• The Mediterranean has the color of mackerel, changeable I mean. You don't always know if it is green or violet, you can't even say it's blue, because the next moment the changing reflection has taken on a tint of rose or gray.
• The best way to know God is to love many things.
• But I always think that the best way to know God is to love many things.
• It always strikes me, and it is very peculiar, that when we see the image of indescribable and unutterable desolation - of loneliness, of poverty and misery, the end of all things, or their extreme - then rises in our mind the thought of God.
• Keep your love of nature, for that is the true way to understand art more and more.
• Love many things, for therein lies the true strength, and whosoever loves much performs much, and can accomplish much, and what is done in love is done well.
• When I have a terrible need of - shall I say the word - religion. Then I go out and paint the stars.

Vincent van Gogh : Biography

Vincent van Gogh born on 1853, in Groot-Zundert, Holland. His colors of paintings was a chief symbol of expression. He was a son of a pastor and brought in a religious and cultured atmosphere. Vincent was highly emotional and lacked of self confidence. Between 1860 and 1880, when he finally decided to become an artist, van Gogh had had two unsuitable and unhappy and had work unsuccessfully as a clerk in a bookstore, an art salesman, and a preacher in the Borinage (a dreary mining district in Belgium), where he was dismissed for overzealousness. He remained in Belgium to study art, determined to give happiness by creating beauty. The works of his early Dutch period are somber-toned, sharply lit, genre paintings of which the most famous is "The Potato Eaters" (1885). In that year van Gogh went to Antwerp where he discovered the works of Rubens and purchased many Japanese prints.

In 1886 he went to Paris to join his brother Théo, the manager of Goupil's gallery. In Paris, van Gogh studied with Cormon, inevitably met Pissarro, Monet, and Gauguin, and began to lighten his very dark palette and to paint in the short brushstrokes of the Impressionists. His nervous temperament made him a difficult companion and night-long discussions combined with painting all day undermined his health. He decided to go south to Arles where he hoped his friends would join him and help found a school of art. Gauguin did join him but with disastrous results. In a fit of epilepsy, van Gogh pursued his friend with an open razor, was stopped by Gauguin, but ended up cutting a portion of his ear lobe off. Van Gogh then began to alternate between fits of madness and lucidity and was sent to the asylum in Saint-Remy for treatment.

In May of 1890, he seemed much better and went to live in Auvers-sur-Oise under the watchful eye of Dr. Gachet. Two months later he was dead, having shot himself "for the good of all." During his brief career he had sold one painting. Van Gogh's finest works were produced in less than three years in a technique that grew more and more impassioned in brushstroke, in symbolic and intense color, in surface tension, and in the movement and vibration of form and line. Van Gogh's inimitable fusion of form and content is powerful; dramatic, lyrically rhythmic, imaginative, and emotional, for the artist was completely absorbed in the effort to explain either his struggle against madness or his comprehension of the spiritual essence of man and nature.

"Vincent"

Did any one hear the song "VINCENT"?.... Vincent is a song sang by Don Mc Lean written as a tribute to Vincent van Gogh. It is known by its opening line, " Starry Starry Night", it is a reference to the painting The Starry Night, the song also describe different paintings done by Vincent van Gogh. "Vincent' was published on October 1971 and recorded on May 1971- June 1971.

The song clearly demonstrates a deep-seated admiration for not only the work of van Gogh, but also for the man himself. The song includes references to his landscape works, in lines such as "sketch the trees and the daffodils" and "morning fields of amber grain" - which describe the amber wheat that features in several paintings. There are also several lines that may allude to van Gogh's self portraits: perhaps in "weathered faces lined in pain / are soothed beneath the artist's loving hand", McLean is suggesting that van Gogh may have found some sort of consolation in creating portraits of himself. There is, too, a single line describing van Gogh's most famous set of works, Sunflowers. "Flaming flowers that brightly blaze" draws not only on the luminous orange and yellow colours of the painting, but also creates powerful images of the sun itself, flaming and blazing, being contained within the flowers and the painting.

In the first two choruses, McLean pays tribute to Van Gogh by reflecting on his lack of recognition: "They would not listen / they did not know how / perhaps they'll listen now." In the final verse, McLean says "They would not listen / They're not listening still / Perhaps they never will." This is the story of van Gogh: unrecognised as an artist until after his death. The lyrics suggest that van Gogh was trying to "set [people] free" with the message in his work. McLean feels that this message was made clear to him: "And now I understand what you tried to say to me," he sings. Perhaps it is this eventual understanding that inspired McLean to write the song.

It is also thought that the song intends to portray van Gogh's tough relationship with his family. They were a wealthy family who did not accept him for his schizophrenia ("for they could not love you") and never understood his will to help the poor. It is thought that van Gogh felt that in killing himself he would make the point to his parents. This is seen in the line "Perhaps they'll listen now." Many believe that the song is a touching tribute to van Gogh in respect of the hardship he faced with regards to his mental illness and his admirable good natured ways.

There are also references to van Gogh's sanity and his suicide. Throughout his life, van Gogh was plagued with mental disorders, particularly depression. He "suffered for his sanity" and eventually "took [his] life, as lovers often do." The word "lover" puts into context how McLean saw the relationship of van Gogh with his art - a relationship of love. This love was strong enough for van Gogh to persevere with his art even without acceptance from his contemporaries: "For they could not love you, but still your love was true."