Van Gogh's Progress

This analysis of the life and work of Vincent Van Gogh aims to represent the artist as a determined modern professional, rather than the image of the tortured romantic hero that is common to art history. The author discusses what she sees as a Utopian idealism infusing both the artist's life and his paintings. She looks at Van Gogh's career from 1882 to 1890 through six utopian projects or professional schemes, each embodying a specific societal crisis for Van Gogh's generation: women and sexuality, rural artisan, republican citizanry, professional identity, the burgeoning art market, and the construction of a modern rural ideal. The author aims to reveal how each endeavour, as Van Gogh treated it, offered a vision of utopian possibility. She also analyzes broader historical problems encountered by all avant-garde artisits of the late-19th century.