(1886)
 

Our artist was born into an upper-middle-class family. As a child he was serious, quiet and thoughtful. He began drawing at an early age and as a young man worked as an art dealer, often traveling, but became depressed after he was transferred to London. He turned to religion and spent time as a Protestant missionary in southern Belgium. He drifted in ill health and solitude before taking up painting in 1881, having returned home to his parents. His younger brother supported him financially; the two kept a long correspondence by letter.

Kingfisher
Second half 1886
Oil on canvas
Amsterdam: Van Gogh Museum

 

From a letter to his brother:

I say that it’s a terrible pity that here there’s no enthusiasm, so to speak, for the art that’s most suitable for the common people.
If the painters were to close ranks to ensure that their work (which, after all, is made for the people, in my view — at least I believe that is the highest, noblest vocation for any artist) could also come into the hands of the people and was put within everyone’s reach, that would be something that would produce the same results as were produced in the first years of The Graphic.