Night Cafe Van Gogh example essay topic

Vincent van Gogh had definitely earned the respect from Paris avant-garde, and even through history, he still remained one of the greatest artists. Van Gogh became an artist at the age of 27. He created hundreds of bold, brilliant paintings. Due to the fast city pace, it had affected his psychological condition.

As a result, he preferred to work by himself. When he was 33, he moved to Paris, becoming into a brilliant colorist. Two years later, he moved to Arles, producing bold, bright paintings and drawings at a miraculous rate. He started suffering illness of insanity.

He moved to Avers, near Paris, continuing to paint in his own way. Unfortunately, he killed himself at the age of 37. His work represents the epitome of expressionism: color, line, and brush stroke are used to express his emotional response to the subject rather than to describe it correctly. The Night Cafe painted in 1888, was meant to convey a darker side of the world through the distortion of colors, the content of the painting, and the symbols (For example, the clock) that lied within the painting. The Night Cafe is Oil on Canvas, 28.5" x 36.25". In the painting, there were people resting, beer bottles on the table, empty and chairs, and the clock, which indicated the lateness of time.

It had an unusual perspective the floor of the cafe covers a large portion of the canvas. It almost appeared as that the artist was suspended high the room to achieve this vantage point. The gas lighting had been introduced at that time, and it allowed the cafe to stay opened very late, as it indicated on the clock. Because of the lateness of time, the night cafe often attracted homeless and drifters.

The lighting in the cafe was very dim, and it seemed like the purpose of it was for the viewer to feel the darkness of the painting. Van Gogh tried to convey the idea of how places like the night cafe were places people could commit crimes and ruin their own lives. Through the use of colors like green, red, yellow, orange, and violet, the Night Cafe had fully portrayed the feeling of coldness and homelessness. As the viewer can see from the painting, the whole atmosphere in the Night Cafe is not so inviting and warm.

The space itself seemed isolated. Although he used red, which usually is a vibrant color, the combination of it with dark green and dark orange just created an atmosphere that is not welcoming. Also, the use of Van Gogh's brushstroke had also added another dark feeling to the painting. The harshly exaggerated brush strokes around the gas lights and use of vivid shades of red and green were deliberately contrived to portray his view of the night cafe. Van Gogh had clearly made the viewers felt the gloomy atmosphere of the painting. The figure in the center of the painting, who is wearing an off-white suit, standing alone, seemed to add another lonely touch to the feel of the painting.

Through the Night Cafe Van Gogh had definitely expressed an unusual perspective by enlarging the floor and drawing the attention on the red wall and green ceiling. Not only did the distorted colors of red, green and yellow showed the destructive mood of the Night Cafe Van Gogh had also definitely done a wonderful job on conveying his message of the destruction of the late night and the Night cafe Most importantly, he made the viewers feel that he had made his point across by the use of the colors, the content, and the symbols that were in the painting. Vincent Van Gogh was, and still is, undoubtedly one of the greatest painters in the world.