Grief (Grief)

This drawing was made by van Gogh in the year when he lived in the Hague. Despite the high-pitched name "Sorrow" and speaking of the sitter's pose, she became the only woman (albeit briefly) allowed Vincent to feel some semblance of happiness.

On Christmas morning 1881 van Gogh seriously quarreled with his father. The cause of the quarrel was that Vincent refused to go with family to Church. In the end, Theodore is almost exposed son out of the house. So the artist was in the Hague.

At that time, Vincent was going through another love tragedy. In the summer he was suddenly smitten with feelings for his cousin Kay (Kee) Vos-Stricker, but she replied with a decisive refusal. Long in letters to his brother Theo, Vincent will remember her fierce "no, no, never." Not surprisingly, in such a vulnerable state, van Gogh attached to the first woman who showed him the location. The fact that Christina Maria Hoornik (better known as Shin) was a homeless prostitute at the time of their acquaintance is pregnant with her second child at all has not confused him. Vincent was sure that saves a bereft woman from certain death. He even seriously intended to marry her. However, Theo so strongly dissuaded him from this step that the artist agreed to postpone marriage until, until you begin to earn himself.

Theo, who was forced to fully provide the older brother, naturally, did not want to take on and even the costs of the women of questionable reputation (besides that van Gogh gonorrhea) and her children. So short of living together Vincent and Sint – first and foremost, to his credit. But, having lived with a woman for a year, van Gogh, and he started to see clearly. In letters he complained to the brother that his woman can't hold a conversation about art, what she's untidy and lazy. In addition, Shin on and off "relapse" as it was called Vincent when she returned to the old craft. At the end of their relationship, the artist more often writes Theo about the little son of Christina, which he apparently truly loved, than about her.

Anyway, you need to give Shin some credit. Despite its contentious nature and profession, she was able to heal some wounds Vincent and never limited his creative impulses.

"Sorrow," Vincent wrote shortly after meeting with Shin at first, he regarded her only as a model (1, 2). In a letter to Theo, the artist wrote that this picture wanted to make a woman like curved tree roots sticking out of the ground. This metaphor is perfectly suited to describe the posture of Sin, weary of poverty, hunger and winter cold. To emphasize the similarity, Vincent was surrounded by her trees and flowers.

Author: Eugene Sidelnikov