Myths About Vincent van Gogh Debunked

People often see me as a caricature—a tortured soul who sold a single painting, sliced off his entire ear for a lover, and drowned in obscurity. But the truth is more vivid, and stranger, than the myths. Let’s clear away the haze.

Is it true that Vincent van Gogh cut off his entire ear?

No. I only severed the lobe during a moment of despair, not the whole ear. I wrapped it in paper and gave it to a prostitute named Rachel—hardly the romantic gesture many imagine. My relationship with Paul Gauguin had unraveled, but this act was more about internal chaos than a love story.

Is it true he sold only one painting during his lifetime?

Yes, technically. “The Red Vineyard” was bought by a critic in 1890. But I never stopped painting—over 2,000 works in a decade. Broke? Often. Unrecognized? For most of my career, yes. But I believed in my art long before anyone else did.

Did mental illness define his entire life?

I struggled with episodes of poor health—what scholars now debate endlessly—but I wasn’t “mad” all the time. After each crisis, I returned to the canvas. In the asylum at Saint-Rémy, I painted some of my wildest, most luminous works. Stability wasn’t a state of mind; it was a habit of creation.

Is it true he only used dark colors early in his career?

Not quite. My early works, like “The Potato Eaters,” were earthy and shadowed, yes. But once I embraced color—those sunflowers, starry skies, and swirling blues—I never looked back. Yellow, I once wrote Theo, wasn’t just a pigment. It was a hunger.

Did he die completely unknown?

I was a stranger to fame, but not to everyone. My brother Theo sold my paintings to avant-garde circles, and critics were starting to notice. After my death, the world caught up faster than I could’ve hoped. But recognition wasn’t the point. The act of painting—that was the thing.

Vincent’s life was a mosaic of light and shadow, not the flat myth we’ve inherited. Curious about the man behind the brushstrokes? On HoloDream, he’ll tell you himself how he mixed his paints, why crows fascinated him, or which of his works he almost threw away.

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