Vincent van Gogh would be 163 years old on Wednesday. He was born March 30, 1853. Although Vincent did not think of himself as a painter until he turned 27, he was an artist much earlier. As far as I can tell, The Goat Herd is his earliest surviving drawing. He was not quite 10 years old when he created it in October of 1862. (It is very hard to find reliable scholarly information on van Gogh’s drawings made before 1877. WikiArt.org and David Brooks’ phenomenal vggallery.com have The Goat Herd as his first. After 10 pages deep on a Google search, nothing contradicts that. If you know of an earlier sketch, please leave a comment below.)
Here two other early drawings by van Gogh (courtesy of WikiArt.org): Corinthian Capital (from when Vincent was 10) and Two Sketches of a Man Leaning on His Spade (when he was 14).
As David Brooks asks, “When does genius begin?” Clearly, quite early for van Gogh.
Van Gogh believed one had to learn to draw before one could paint. Although his adult drawings are not as widely appreciated as his paintings, they are still excellent. Here is a wonderful reference book: Vincent Van Gogh: The Drawings (Metropolitan Museum of Art Series).
Where does today’s artwork appear in Vincent, Theo and the Fox? It is not part of the story but appears in his biography at the end of the book.
And speaking of Vincent, Theo and the Fox, to celebrate van Gogh’s birthday I’m giving away three copies of the book.
Click here to enter giveaway (administered by Amazon.com). NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. Ends the earlier of Apr 4, 2016 11:59 PM PDT, or when all prizes are claimed. See Official Rules http://amzn.to/GArules.
Hope you win,
Ted Macaluso
© 2016 by Ted Macaluso. May be freely reproduced if attribution is given back to http://www.tedmacaluso.com.
Ted Macaluso - Author 