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Dear Theo,
You will have received my letters, I now answer yours, which
came this afternoon. According to your wish I immediately sent
Tersteeg the 10 guilders I had borrowed from him this week.
I wrote you about C. M.'s order - it happened this way. C.
M. seems to have spoken with Tersteeg before he came to see me,
at least he began by saying the same things about
“earning my bread.” My reply came on the spur of
the moment, quick, and I believe this is exactly what I said,
“Earn bread - how do you mean? Earn bread, or deserve
bread? Not to deserve one's bread - that is, to be unworthy of
it - is certainly a crime, for every honest man is worthy of
his bread; but unluckily, not being able to earn it, though
deserving it, is a misfortune, and a great misfortune. So if
you say to me, “You are unworthy of your bread,” you insult me.
But if you make the rather just remark that I do not always
earn it - for sometimes I have none - well, that may be true,
but what's the use of making the remark? It does not get me any
further if that's all you say.”
So then C. M. didn't talk about “earning bread”
any more.
However, the thunderstorm threatened once more, for when by
chance I mentioned De Groux's name in speaking about
expression, C. M. said abruptly, “But do you not know
that in private life De Groux has a bad reputation?”
As you can imagine, C. M. touched a delicate point there,
and ventured on slippery ground. I could not stand to hear this
said of honest father De Groux. So I replied, “It has
always seemed to me that when an artist shows his work to the
public, he has the right to keep the inner struggle of his own
private life to himself (which is directly and inevitably
connected with the peculiar difficulties involved in producing
a work of art), unless he wants to confide them to a very
intimate friend. I repeat, it is very improper for a critic to
dig up a man's private life when his work is above reproach. De
Groux is a master like Millet, like Gavarni.”
C. M. had certainly never considered Gavarni a master. (To
any other but C. M. I would have expressed myself more briefly
and strongly by saying, An artist's work and his private life
are like a woman in childbirth and her baby. You may look at
the child, but you may not lift her chemise to see if it is
bloodstained. That would be very indelicate on the occasion of
a post-partum visit.)
I had already begun to be afraid that C. M. would be angry,
but luckily things took a better turn. To change the subject, I
got out my portfolio with smaller studies and sketches. He did
not say anything until we came to a little drawing which I once
sketched at twelve o'clock at night while strolling around with
Breitner, the Paddemoes (that Jewish quarter near the New
Church) as seen from the Peat Market. Next
morning I had worked on it again with my pen.
Jules Bakhuyzen had also looked at the little thing and
immediately recognized the spot.
“Could you make some more of these views of the
city?” asked C. M.
“Yes, I make them for a change sometimes when I am
tired from working with the model - there is the Vleersteeg -
the Geest - the Fish Market.”
“Then make twelve for me.”
“Yes,” said I, “but this is business, so
we must fix a price at once. I have set the price for a small
drawing of this size, either in pencil or pen, at 2.50 guilders
- do you think that unreasonable?”
“No,” he said, “but if they turn out well,
I will ask you to make twelve more of Amsterdam, and then I
shall fix the price myself, so that you will get a little more
for them.”
Well, I think that pretty successful for a visit which I
more or less dreaded.
Seeing that we agreed, Theo, that I should tell you things
spontaneously, in my own way, I describe those little scenes to
you just as they happen. Particularly since in this way, though
you are absent, you get a glimpse of my studio.
I long very much for your coming, because then I can speak
more seriously with you, for instance, about what happened at
home.
C. M.'s order is like a ray of hope to me.
I will do my best on these little drawings and try to put
some character into them. At all events you will see them, and
I think, boy, that there is more of that kind of business to be
done. One can find buyers for small drawings at 5 fr. With some
practice I can make one every day. And look here, if they turn
out well, they will provide me with a crust of bread and a
guilder for the model every day. Summertime with the long days
is approaching; I make my “soup ticket” - meaning
the bread and model drawing - either in the morning or in the
evening, and in the daytime I study seriously from the model.
C. M. is one buyer whom I found myself; perhaps you will
succeed in finding a second, and perhaps Tersteeg, when he has
got over his fit of reproaches, may find a third, and then
we'll be in business.
Tomorrow morning I will go out to find a subject for C. M.'s
drawings. This evening I was at Pulchri. Tableaux vivants and a
kind of farce by Tony Offermans. I did not stay for the farce
because I do not like them and I cannot stand the close air of
a crowded hall, but I wanted to see the tableaux, especially as
there was one after an etching which I had given to Mauve,
“The Stable at Bethlehem” by Nicolaes Maes (the
other was Rembrandt's “Isaac Blessing Jacob,” with
a splendid Rebecca looking on to see if her trick will
succeed). The Nicolaes Maes was very good in tone and colour,
but the expression was not worth anything. The expression was
decidedly wrong. Once I saw this in reality, not of course the
birth of Christ, but the birth of a calf. And I remember
exactly how the expression was. There was a little girl in the
stable that night - in the Borinage - a little brown peasant
girl with a white nightcap: she had tears of compassion in her
eyes for the poor cow when the poor thing was in throes and was
having great trouble. It was pure, holy, wonderful, beautiful,
like a Correggio, a Millet, an Israëls. Oh, Theo, why
don't you give up the whole thing and become a painter? You can
if you want to, boy; I sometimes suspect you of concealing a
famous landscape painter within yourself. Entre nous soit dit,
I think you would draw birch trees wonderfully, and the furrows
in the field or a field of stubble, and paint snow and the sky,
etc. With a handshake,
Yours sincerely, Vincent
Say, Theo, won't you think about the idea that there is a
famous landscape painter hidden inside you? We both must become
painters, court et bon, we will earn our crust anyhow. For
drawing the figure one must be more or less of a drudge or a
beast of burden, more homme de peine. There's a long, long
thought for you - old boy.
Theo, do not become materialistic like Tersteeg. The problem
is, Theo, my brother, not to let yourself be bound, no matter
by what, especially not by a golden chain.
Quoiqu'il en soit, to be an artist is sounder; the money
difficulty especially is very bad, but I repeat, as a landscape
painter you would overcome it sometime also. But if you once
start, you are bound to overtake me, for figure drawing is more
complicated, advances more slowly.
You understand I am completely serious.
Here follows a list of Dutch pictures intended for the
Salon.
Israëls', “An Old Man” (if he were not a
fisherman, it might be Thomas Carlyle, the author of the French
Revolution and Oliver Cromwell, for he decidedly has a head
characteristic of Carlyle) is sitting in a corner near the
hearth, on which a small piece of peat is faintly glowing in
the twilight. For it is a dark little cottage where that old
man sits, an old cottage with a small white-curtained window.
His dog, which has grown old with him, sits beside his chair -
those two old friends look at each other, they look into each
other's eyes, the dog and the man. And meanwhile the old man
takes his tobacco pouch out of his pocket and lights his pipe
in the twilight. That is all - the twilight, the silence, the
loneliness of those two old friends, the man and the dog, the
understanding between those two, the meditation of the old man
- what he is thinking of, I do not know, I cannot tell, but it
must be a deep, long thought, something, but I do not know
what; it comes rising from a past long ago - perhaps that
thought gives the expression to his face, an expression
melancholy, contented, submissive, something that reminds one
of Longfellow's famous poem with the refrain: But the thoughts
of youth are long, long thoughts. [Longfellow: “Lost
Youth”]
I should like to see this picture by Israëls hanging
beside “Death and the Woodcutter” by Millet. I
certainly do not know a single picture except this Israëls
which is the equal of Millet's “Death and the
Woodcutter,” or is worthy of being shown with it. And
then I feel in my mind an irresistible longing to bring these
two pictures together, so they can complete each other. I think
what is wanting in this Israëls is Millet's “Death
and the Woodcutter” hanging near it, one at one end, the
other at the other end of a long, narrow gallery - with no
other pictures in that gallery but these two, they and no
others. It is a famous Israëls; I could not really see
anything else, I was so struck by it.
And yet there was another Israëls, a small one, with
five or six figures, I think, a peasant family at mealtime.
There is a Mauve, the large picture of the fishing smack
drawn up to the dunes; it is a masterpiece.
I never heard a good sermon on resignation, nor can I
imagine a good one, except that picture by Mauve and the work
of Millet.
That is the resignation - the real kind, not that of
the clergymen. Those nags, those poor, ill-treated old nags,
black, white and brown; they are standing there, patient,
submissive, willing, resigned and quiet. They have still to
draw the heavy boat up the last bit of the way - the job is
almost finished. Stop a moment. They are panting, they are
covered with sweat, but they do not murmur, they do not
protest, they do not complain, not about anything. They got
over that long ago, years and years ago. They are resigned to
living and working somewhat longer, but if they have to go to
the knacker tomorrow, well, so be it, they are ready. I find
such a mighty, deep, practical, silent philosophy in this
picture - it seems to say, “Savoir souffrir sans se
plaindre, ça c'est la seule chose practique, c'est
là la grande science, la leçon à
apprendre, la solution du problème de la vie.”
[Knowing how to suffer without complaining, that is the only
practical thing, it is the great science, the lesson to learn,
the solution of the problem of life.] I think this picture by
Mauve would be one of the rare pictures before which Millet
would remain standing a long time, and mutter to himself,
“Il a du coeur ca peintre-là.”
There were some more pictures - I must tell you that I
hardly looked at them - these two were enough for me.
At this time, Vincent was 28 year oldSource: Vincent van Gogh. Letter to Theo van Gogh. Written c. 11 March 1882 in The Hague. Translated by Mrs. Johanna van Gogh-Bonger, edited by Robert Harrison, number 181. URL: https://www.webexhibits.org/vangogh/letter/11/181.htm.
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