Vincent Van Gogh's Death

1037 Words3 Pages

1. The “world’s most beloved Dutch Artist” Vincent Van Gogh who was born on the 30thof March in 1853 in the Netherlands and sadly died in Auvers-sur-Oise France July the 29th 1890. During Vincent’s Van Gogh’s life his paintings never got the recognition they deserved, only after his death did people start to recognise the quality of his work. 2. It is led to popular belief that the famous Dutch painter Vincent Van Gogh took his own life. This was made evident in 2013 when two scholars, Louis van Triborgh and Teio Meedendorp who were associated with the Van Gogh Museum, released a critical review in the highly acclaimed Burlington Magazine (a British magazine). The review claimed that Vincent took his own life through the surviving forensic …show more content…

Despite the popular belief that Vincent’s Van Gogh took his own life, two biographers Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith contradicted what has been the belief of many for decades. The evidence written in their Vanity Fair article suggest that the renowned painter Vincent Van Gogh was murdered. On day of Vincent’s death he wrote, in his writing there wasn’t a word about taking his own life which was surprising for someone who wrote so often .The writing done that day was a final draft of a letter that was to be sent to his bother Hugo, the letter was “upbeat – even ebullient about his future. He had even placed a large order for more paints only a few day before a bullet put a hole in his abdomen” (Vanity Fair, December 2014). Since the bullet missed his vital organs, it was a very slow and painful death. The absents of a suicide letter suggests that Vincent Van Gogh didn’t intend to take his own life. Evidence provided by Dr Vincent Di Maio who has a long distinguished career as a handgun forensic expert. At the request of Naifeh and Smith he compared the evidence in there book to the article published by Van Triborgh and Meedendorp. Dr Maio differed on nearly every point. He stated that the purple halo had nothing to do with the closeness of the gun, and that “this is subcutaneous bleeding form vessels cut by the bullet and is usually seen in individuals who live awhile” (Vanity Fair, December 2014), the presence or absent of the purple halo means nothing. Dr Maio

Open Document