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UPDATED VERSION: Vincent Van Gogh's The Starry Night: Great Art Explained — Transcript

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0:15On May the 8th, 1889, [music]
0:17Vincent van Gogh is admitted to a mental
0:20asylum outside Saint-Rémy in Provence.
0:22[music]
0:23He would spend just over a year there.
0:26It was originally planned that he'd go
0:28to a large public institution in
0:30Marseille with over a thousand patients
0:32right in the heart of the city. If he
0:35had, there was no chance he would have
0:37produced the extraordinary work he did.
0:40In the small asylum at Saint-Rémy, with
0:43only 41 patients, Vincent would be
0:45treated with kindness and understanding.
0:48The doctors quickly recognized that
0:50painting was central to his well-being.
0:53He was given the space and freedom to
0:55work, and the asylum staff generally
0:57encouraged his artistic practice. In the
1:00asylum, as other patients screamed
1:02throughout the night, Vincent's
1:04creativity and work ethic remained
1:06extraordinary.
1:08He spent every waking hour painting,
1:10producing mostly optimistic landscapes.
1:13He worked with remarkable speed, often
1:16finishing a painting in just a few
1:18hours. Incredibly, considering his
1:21circumstances, [music] he completed at
1:23least 150 paintings during his stay at
1:26Saint-Rémy, roughly one painting every
1:29other day.
1:31>> [music]
1:31>> And it was on the 18th of June, 1889,
1:34that he painted The Starry Night.
1:55In popular culture, van Gogh is often
1:58seen as the archetypal mad artist. Yet,
2:01most of the time he was lucid, rational,
2:04and deeply engaged with the world around
2:06him. He approached painting with
2:08astonishing discipline,
2:10studied color theory obsessively,
2:13analyzed other artists, and worked to a
2:15schedule.
2:17Behind the mythology was a hard-working,
2:19dedicated man serious about his craft.
2:23He was also intelligent, articulate, and
2:26exceptionally well-read.
2:28He spoke four languages, knew art
2:30history intimately, and maintained
2:33friendships and correspondences
2:35throughout his life. But, he struggled
2:37to understand his place in the world.
2:40After a particularly difficult period
2:42living with Paul Gauguin, he suffered a
2:45serious mental health crisis that
2:47culminated in hallucinations and hearing
2:49voices,
2:51leading to the incident in which he cut
2:53off part of his ear.
2:55The doctors at the asylum diagnosed
2:57epilepsy, although Vincent's condition
2:59remains the subject of debate among
3:01historians and medical researchers. What
3:04is clear is that he experienced periods
3:07of severe mental distress,
3:09hallucinations, and episodes that
3:12interrupted his work and daily life.
3:15He called his fellow patients his
3:16companions in misfortune, and recent
3:19research suggests that Vincent was often
3:22more lucid and self-aware than many of
3:24those around him. Overall, the asylum
3:27had a positive effect on him, and he was
3:30well enough to paint about 75% of the
3:32time.
3:33One visitor, when he came to see
3:35Vincent, found him to be in perfect
3:37physical and mental health. And after he
3:40left the asylum, he went to Paris to
3:42visit his brother Theo, whose wife Jo
3:44remarked on how healthy he looked.
3:47In the asylum, he was drinking a lot
3:49less, no absinthe, no complicated
3:51romances, and a regular routine with
3:54three meals a day. Isolation turned out
3:57to be good for him, and with no outside
3:59distractions, Vincent, always a hard
4:02worker, would channel all his energies
4:05into his work.
4:10When we think of 19th century asylums,
4:12we think of them as horrific
4:13institutions.
4:15But the founder of Saint-Rémy Asylum was
4:18a progressive who believed that being
4:20surrounded by nature was good for
4:21troubled minds and had planted extensive
4:25gardens. He also believed in the healing
4:27power of art and music.
4:30Of course, it was not easy for Vincent,
4:32and he suffered attacks when he was
4:34unable to paint. But, it could have been
4:37a lot worse.
4:38His brother Theo, who was paying for the
4:40treatment, insisted that the asylum
4:42allowed Vincent to paint, and he was
4:45given a dedicated studio. His paintings
4:48are often represented as evidence of
4:50madness, but the reality may be closer
4:53to the opposite. Painting gave Vincent
4:56structure, purpose, and meaning. He
4:59created these images despite his
5:01illness, not because of it.
5:04However, as he was led into his sparse
5:06cell on the first day, he must have been
5:08terrified, but also reassured to find
5:11that, although his window had bars, the
5:13view was spectacular. Wheatfields glowed
5:16in the sun with olive groves and
5:18vineyards receding into the distant
5:20foothills of a low mountain range called
5:23Les Alpilles.
5:25Initially, he portrayed the world he saw
5:28from his room, the subject of many
5:30paintings at the asylum.
5:32But within weeks, he would be allowed to
5:33wander around the dramatic countryside
5:36alone.
5:37The morning after his arrival at the
5:39asylum, Vincent went into the walled
5:41garden, set up his easel, and by
5:44lunchtime had painted this, the first of
5:47his asylum masterpieces.
5:53Van Gogh was a largely self-taught
5:55artist [music] who didn't seriously pick
5:56up a paintbrush until he was 27 years
5:59old. And just 10 years later, he would
6:02be dead.
6:03It was really his last 4 years where he
6:05developed the style we would come to
6:07know him by, and these were also his
6:09most prolific years.
6:11Once he found his way, it was as if he
6:14was making up for lost time.
6:16Vincent's 2 years in Paris up until
6:19February 1888 are widely seen as laying
6:22the foundation for his later unique
6:24style, exposing him to the influence of
6:26impressionists such as Monet and
6:28Pissarro, but also a younger generation
6:31of artists including Paul Signac, Émile
6:34Bernard, and Toulouse-Lautrec, who will
6:36all remain lifelong friends.
6:39Like many of that generation, he was
6:41influenced by Japanese prints, which
6:43along with his Paris years would have a
6:45transformative effect on his work and
6:48lay the foundations for radical works
6:50like The Starry Night.
6:52We know for a fact that Vincent was an
6:54admirer of Hokusai's The Great Wave, and
6:57here we can make comparisons not only
7:00between the composition, but also
7:02between the rich blue tones of Hokusai's
7:04tempestuous seas and the turbulent skies
7:07of The Starry Night.
7:09Alongside these Japanese prints and the
7:11innovations of Paris, Vincent remained
7:14deeply influenced by the peasant
7:16paintings of Jean-François Millet, who
7:18he saw almost like a spiritual guide.
7:21Millet's images of peasants sowing,
7:23harvesting, and working the land deeply
7:26influenced Van Gogh's belief that
7:28ordinary rural life was a worthy subject
7:31for art.
7:32In Paris, he went to see this ceiling
7:34mural by Eugène Delacroix in the Louvre,
7:38and it was a revelation how bright
7:40contrasting colors could work together.
7:42Vincent proceeded to read everything he
7:44could on Delacroix's color theories,
7:47which involved placing opposite colors
7:49on the color wheel together, a
7:51combination which gives high contrast
7:53and high impact. For example, red and
7:56green, or blue and orange.
7:59This had a profound impact on Vincent's
8:01later paintings, when the bright new
8:03palette takes over from his previous
8:06dark muted color scheme.
8:08A period that also coincided with the
8:10invention of many new synthetic pigments
8:13that Vincent took advantage of. Color,
8:16above all, was Vincent's visual
8:18vocabulary.
8:20With these later works, we also see more
8:22and more Japanese influence.
8:25Blocks of pure color, dark outlines, no
8:28shadows, unusual cropping, and distorted
8:31perspective.
8:33Having started so late, Vincent spent
8:35the final years of his life absorbing
8:37all of these influences with
8:39extraordinary
8:41and transforming them into a style that
8:44was unmistakably his own.
8:51This morning, I saw the countryside from
8:53my window, a long time before sunrise,
8:56with nothing but the morning star, which
8:59looked very big. [music]
9:02This was one of the many letters Vincent
9:04wrote to friends that mentioned a starry
9:06night, and it was something he had
9:08planned for a while.
9:10The painting depicts the view from his
9:12asylum window on the upper floor.
9:14He had already painted the view dozens
9:16of times, but this time it was a
9:18nocturne, which, as he couldn't paint in
9:21the dark, meant it was painted from
9:23memory during the day in his ground
9:25floor studio.
9:27Like the Impressionists, Vincent
9:28insisted on working from nature, but a
9:31few months earlier, Paul Gauguin had
9:33tried to persuade him to paint from his
9:35imagination.
9:37Vincent resisted then, but in the
9:39asylum, with limited freedom of
9:41movement, it was a necessity. The Starry
9:44Night is one of those rare moments. He
9:46is no longer simply recording the world
9:48in front of him. He is transforming it,
9:51creating in paint something we cannot
9:53see or touch, something immaterial.
9:57By combining observation with memory,
10:00imagination, and emotion, he is not
10:02creating a view from a window, but
10:04rather a vision of the world transformed
10:07through his experience.
10:09This is a critical moment in the history
10:11of art. Artists were increasingly moving
10:14away from factual descriptions towards
10:16something more subjective. Art was
10:18becoming a way of expressing how the
10:21world feels, rather than simply how it
10:23looks. Vincent uses paint to create a
10:26sky that feels electric, alive, and in
10:29motion, and in doing so, he helps pave
10:32the way for modern art.
10:37The views he painted from his window are
10:39all linked by the diagonal line coming
10:41in from the right, depicting the low
10:44rolling hills.
10:45In reality, the cypress trees were much
10:48smaller, and beyond the far wall
10:50enclosing the wheat field. For Starry
10:52Night, Vincent brings the tree much
10:54closer to the picture plane, which
10:57reminds us of the tight cropping we see
10:59in Japanese prints.
11:01The cypress tree was a newly discovered
11:03motif for Vincent, and is seen as the
11:06symbol of death in Mediterranean
11:08culture.
11:09Here, the tree shoots up into the sky,
11:12linking heaven and earth.
11:14Vincent himself compared cypresses to
11:17Egyptian obelisks, and saw them as
11:19beautiful, rather than mournful, symbols
11:22of transcendence.
11:24The white band hanging over the hills is
11:27almost certainly the morning mist.
11:29By At time he painted the Starry Night,
11:31he was allowed out to explore the area
11:33alone. And it was on one of these walks
11:36he drew this bird's-eye view of the
11:38village.
11:39In the painting, he places the village
11:41in the valley,
11:42even though it was not visible from
11:44Vincent's room or from his studio, and
11:47was in fact in the opposite direction.
11:50He shows a dozen or so houses, whereas
11:52in fact there were hundreds.
11:54He has those houses lit by impossibly
11:57bright gas lamps as a device to balance
12:00out the yellow stars above.
12:02Vincent paints an idealized village, and
12:05it bears no resemblance to the real one
12:07or even its domed church of Saint-Rémy.
12:11The church is unmistakably northern
12:13European rather than Provençal. This is
12:16an easy detail to miss, but it is
12:19important
12:20because The Starry Night is not really a
12:22landscape in the traditional sense. It
12:25is not about recording a place
12:27accurately.
12:28Vincent is assembling memories,
12:30observations, symbols, and emotions into
12:34a single image. The village below
12:37becomes less a real settlement than an
12:39idea,
12:40an idea of home.
12:43It is the contrast between the sleeping
12:45motionless village and the swirling
12:47turbulent skies that creates much of the
12:49emotional power of the picture, that
12:51creates the tension.
12:54Above, the universe seems to pulse with
12:56energy. Below, human life remains quiet
13:00and fragile.
13:02In a sense, the painting becomes a
13:03meeting place between the landscapes of
13:06Provence and the memories of home.
13:12The sky is painted [music] with
13:13Vincent's signature short brushstrokes
13:15of thick impasto, his personal
13:17vocabulary of mark making. We can see
13:20how he applies the impasto technique,
13:23painting so thickly, sometimes straight
13:25from the tube, spreading paint like
13:27butter with a palette knife.
13:30In places, the paint stands out of the
13:32canvas by several millimeters. This
13:34means it catches the light and gives the
13:37painting a physical presence that
13:39reproductions struggle to show.
13:42Technical studies show that The Starry
13:44Night was painted with remarkable
13:46confidence. There is very little
13:48reworking. The brushstrokes may appear
13:50spontaneous, but they were carefully
13:52controlled and laid down with
13:54astonishing speed.
13:55This contributes to the sense of
13:57immediacy and vitality, making us the
14:00viewer aware not only of what Vincent
14:03saw, but of the physical act of him
14:05painting it.
14:07It is these paint-heavy, stabbing
14:09brushstrokes that distinguishes Vincent
14:11from the other Post-Impressionists.
14:13Color was simply Vincent's way of
14:15communicating, and he had an innate and
14:18even avant-garde tendency towards colors
14:21that were expressive and intense. He
14:23took all that he had learned about
14:25complementary color theory and applied
14:27it to The Starry Night.
14:29And it was the Impressionists in Paris
14:31that gave him looser, lighter
14:32brushstrokes, and the pointillist
14:34Georges Seurat who introduced him to
14:36optical mixing, pure colors blended by
14:39the eye to form a coherent image.
14:43The blues are not simply flat areas of
14:45color. He layers different shades,
14:47cobalt blue, ultramarine, and touches of
14:50green and violet, allowing them to
14:52vibrate against one another.
14:55The yellows and oranges of the stars are
14:57placed against these blues to create
14:59maximum intensity, drawing on those
15:02color theories of Delacroix.
15:04>> But new research finds that these famous
15:06swirls actually match up with our
15:08>> But is it an accurate depiction of the
15:10stars on or around June the 18th?
15:13Astronomers have worked out that the
15:15moon that night was actually almost
15:17full, rather than the crescent moon we
15:20see in the painting, a motif we often
15:22find in Japanese prints.
15:25And Venus, the brightest star, was only
15:27visible just before dawn, by which time
15:30the moon was not visible from Vincent's
15:33room. In this recreation, we can see the
15:35constellation Aries was also visible. I
15:39think it's clear The Starry Night is an
15:41amalgamation of night time and dawn
15:43views from his window.
15:46But just how stylized are Vincent's
15:48swirling galaxies? If we look at a
15:51modern image of the Whirlpool Galaxy, it
15:53bears a striking resemblance to
15:55Vincent's stars. But could he have known
15:58about spiral galaxies back in 1889?
16:01This drawing, made by the English
16:03astronomer Lord Rosse in 1850, was
16:06reproduced as an etching in a French
16:08astronomy book, which had caused a
16:10sensation. And Vincent, who was
16:12passionate about astronomy, had even met
16:14the author in Paris.
16:17In 2004, physicists studying fluid
16:20turbulence noticed something
16:21extraordinary.
16:23The patterns in The Starry Night
16:25appeared to resemble mathematical
16:26structures found in turbulent flows.
16:29Whether Vincent understood any of this
16:32is irrelevant. What matters is that he
16:34somehow found a visual language capable
16:37of expressing forces that are invisible
16:40but deeply familiar to us.
16:45His brother Theo would later say that
16:47The Starry Night was style over
16:49substance, and even Vincent had doubts
16:51about it. He worried that he had strayed
16:54too far from nature and into
16:56abstraction. Ironically, what both
16:59brothers saw as a weakness is exactly
17:01what later generations would celebrate.
17:04Like all great paintings, The Starry
17:06Night has been interpreted in many ways,
17:08notably concerning Vincent's religious
17:11beliefs. Although he became an
17:13evangelical preacher in his 20s, he
17:15later rejected Christianity. But when
17:18Vincent lost his faith, he transferred
17:20many of his ideas into his art. Hard
17:23work and the appreciation of nature were
17:25seen as part of the worship of God in
17:27the Protestant tradition in which he was
17:29raised. His art had always emphasized
17:32the changing and renewing powers of the
17:34seasons, and there was no harder working
17:37artist than Vincent. In less than a
17:39decade, he created around 2,100
17:42artworks, including around 860 oil
17:46paintings, most of which date from the
17:48last 2 years of his life.
17:50Vincent often spoke of art as a new
17:52religion, a way to console people, and
17:55The Starry Night in particular reflected
17:57these beliefs.
17:58Nature for him was a source of the
18:00infinite, and the stars had a deep
18:03spiritual meaning.
18:05Stars that must have been a comfort as
18:07he gazed at the night sky from his cell.
18:10In one letter, Vincent wrote that
18:12looking at the stars made him think
18:14about death in the same way that trains
18:16made us think about distant
18:18destinations,
18:19not as something frightening, but as a
18:21journey into the unknown.
18:24The stars offered perspective. They
18:26reminded him that human troubles were
18:28small when measured against the vastness
18:30of the universe.
18:35Few paintings have entered popular
18:37culture quite like The Starry Night, yet
18:40its popularity may stem from something
18:42surprisingly simple.
18:44Most landscapes show us the world as it
18:47appears. The Starry Night shows us the
18:49world as it feels.
18:52We may never have stood in Vincent's
18:54room at Saint-Rémy, but we can recognize
18:57wonder, loneliness, hope, and
18:59uncertainty. The painting feels personal
19:03to Vincent, yet somehow belongs to all
19:06of us.
19:10Van Gogh considered The Starry Night a
19:12failure.
19:14He felt it relied too much on
19:16imagination [music] and not enough on
19:18direct observation.
19:20Yet, it is precisely this departure from
19:22reality that makes the painting so
19:24extraordinarily powerful. Millions of
19:27people recognize themselves in those
19:29swirling skies, not because Vincent was
19:32a genius driven by madness, but because
19:35he achieved something far more
19:36difficult.
19:37>> [music]
19:37>> He found a way to transform private
19:40experience into something universal.
19:43Standing in a small asylum room in
19:45Provence, looking out through a barred
19:47window, Vincent Van Gogh painted a
19:50vision of the infinite.
19:52More than a century later, those stars
19:55still seem to move and the sky still
19:58seems alive.
19:59And somehow, we are still looking out of
20:02that window
20:03>> [music]
20:03>> with him.

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