Theo Van Gogh 1857™1891: Art Dealer, Collector and Brother of Vincent

Rating:
Summary: Always Overshadowed
Review: Throughout much of his life the Dutch artist Vincent Van Gogh suffered from emotional extremes, alternating from violent excitability to melancholic withdrawal, moods that are often observable in his self-portraits, landscape paintings and so on. As the quintessential expressionist, he has always overshadowed his younger brother, Theo, who supported him both emotionally and monetarily, but who, as this book documents, also pursued a successful career as a Paris-based art dealer. Vincent took his own life in 1890; while Theo died a year later (at age 33), apparently of dementia paralytica, the last stage of syphilis. This beautifully produced book, which consists of three scholarly essays, a chronology and nearly 200 reproductions of historic photographs and works of art, presents an account of the life of the two, while emphasizing the larger context of Theo's activities as a dealer, who was, like his brother, ahead of his time. It was published in conjunction with an exhibition at museums in Amsterdam and Paris in 1999 and 2000 of works bought, sold and/or collected by Theo Van Gogh. (Review copyright © by Roy R. Behrens from Ballast Quarterly Review 15, No. 4, Summer 2000.)