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BESW

03:52

> If ONE MORE PERSON says “What if they’d medicated Van Gogh!?” I think I’m permitted to set things on fire. If they’d medicated Van Gogh, he’d either have painted twice as much, or he’d have been happy and unproductive. And you know what? Starry Night wasn’t worth a terrible price in human misery. It’s neat. It wasn’t worth it.
Sometimes I wonder if being an artist makes me jaded to ART. Because it’s not magic and it’s not mystical, it’s just paint or pixels. And it can do amazing things! But you don’t owe humanity to be miserable just so you can move paint around in interesting shapes.…

- Ursula Vernon

trogdor

04:16

well then, if you feel that way

still, my mother is kinda way into some Van Gogh stuff

does that mean she is happy that he cut his ear off or something? (I think he is the one that did that?) most likely not

but it would have made some kind of difference in my life if his life went differently

does that mean I am glad he suffered? not exactly no, but I will say that something different happening to or in his life would have made a difference in the world

even if all it was was him suffering less and less or practically no people having any clue who he was

life is weird like that

BESW

I think the basic idea she's railing against is that art justifies the misery of artists.

trogdor

I certainly agree that it should not

I think you should really love it as a hobby, not take it as a thing you should suffer to do

but it should also be kept in mind that he lived in a slightly different time period here

he, one would assume, loved painting, and it might not be too hard to say that maybe during his lifetime and even beforehand, that many artists did have to suffer in some way just to do art as much as they liked

even nowadays, most people have to keep up a job and only paint on time off, at least till they retire

BESW

mm. She's responding to modern folks who use Van Gogh's artistic output as support for fetishising mental illness and not treating it.

trogdor

that is a thing that shouldn't need to happen, yeah

I will make the small argument that no one should even be using him as an example

citing "lived in significantly different time period" again

BESW

Yeah.

trogdor

04:23

not her fault that people used him as an example and she got mad for it XD

9 hours later…

BESW

13:42

@nitsua60 Although I'm happy to talk with you about this stuff in chat, if your interest is more personal and less academic you might be more comfortable discussing it in a less public and archived setting?

nitsua60

14:14

@BESW Actually, I'm perfectly comfortable in chat, too. (Being the oversharer that I am already!) As long as you don't think it'd make passers-by uncomfortable, that is. It's just a busy weekend for me.... March gets to be pretty relaxed for me--I'll probably pester you about it then =)

9 hours later…