It’s no secret that Van Gogh is one of the greatest artists in history. His paintings have recently sold for $38.2 million, and combined, his worth is over a billion now. He has influenced artists around the world, and his most famous work, The Starry Night, is kept in the prestigious Museum of Modern Art. He is known for creating the most vividly astounding and eye-catching paintings that one can’t help but awe at. Don’t believe me? Take a good look at his painting, The Red Vineyards at Arles and see what I mean.
All this being said, you’ll be surprised to hear that he didn’t get this praise overnight. In fact, he didn’t get it at all until he was already dead. He killed himself in 1809, having only sold one painting, and the biggest supporter being his own brother. Thankfully, after the latter died as well, his widow was able to successfully promote Van Gogh’s name through a massive exhibition in 1905. If only he lived that long.
A fact that’s even more tragic is that Van Gogh is not the only artist to only become famous after his death. Edgar Allen Poe, Johannes Vermer, Vivian Maier. These are all artists, in different fields of course, who were never embraced in life but after death, they’re work was celebrated around the world as “genius” and “extraordinary”. Those artists eventually get biopics, documentaries, biographies, everything to keep their names heard. The saddest part about this is those artists will never know about any of this because, well, they’re dead.
“Dead But Not Forgotten” is a term that is not as easily passed along as people might think. To put it simply, the Huffington Post found that an artist may either gain an abundance of recognition, have their sales come to a halt, or they may remain unheard of. The Post gave Bernard Karfiol as an example of the second and (to a degree) third reason. A well-known artist of his time, who’s death never caused his paintings to go up in worth, instead coming to a flatline. Now think about this, how many of you knew Karfiol before I mentioned him here? Hence my point on the third reason.
There are some reasons for a lack of fame. For instance, blogger Melody Fletcher stated that an artist is “horribly vulnerable to criticism”. Meaning that because of their perfectionist nature, the project they’ve done, their “child”, is meant for the world to see, and if a critic were to voice their disapproval, they’d be shattering that belief the artist has. In time, the latter will think their hard work is simply not meant for the public at all. Look at Franz Kafka who, in his dying breath, asked for his friend Max Brod to burn the literature he’d written after he passed. Any hope Kafka had of his books being famous was lost, and he wanted them to die with him. A terrible ending, but an important example. Spoiler alert, Brod didn’t burn them.
This reason leads to the classic phrase, “I’m doing this for myself”. There are artists around the world who haven’t even been criticized for their work because no one knows about it. Because they’re not showing it. The most damming cause is fear. A fear that what they have will never be good enough. A fear that they’ll be constantly lambasted, a fear that they’ll die miserable and penniless like the ones I mentioned already. That said, they find other things to do besides promoting their art when what they have might make them a lot of money if shown to the right person. It’s sad, but the real world is a terrifying place, and nothing is guaranteed, so it makes sense.
The dead but not forgotten artist is truly a terrible position to be in. I can’t imagine the torment and utter defeat people like Van Gogh died in, and as a writer, I too fear that same fate. However, I chose to create this website and this blog, and I choose to write new stories that I will promote like crazy because I have hope that at least one of them will succeed. Any artist who is reading this should too. My biggest piece of advice however is not to put your whole life on your art. If that fails, make sure you have a backup plan and find and develop new skills and opportunities, so you don’t end up penniless. Trust me, it’ll be less painful in the end.