Journey to the sun

Journey to the sun is an abstraction of the route that Vincent van Gogh has traveled his life. The journey starts in Zundert and ends in Auvers-sur-Oise. Vincent spent his life catching the light. The choice of material and color of the work of art symbolize this search.

This work of art is cut into brass. The back is spray-painted with bio-fluorine in the color of the sun. Partly due to the change of light during the day and because the artwork hangs 1 cm from the wall, it is a dynamic work of art. The reflection of the fluor is visible on the wall and under UV light, the accents are further emphasized.

Details
PETRA HART
Journey to the sun
2018
200x100 cm
Unique 
 

Journey to the sun is an abstraction of the route Vincent van Gogh has traveled his life and is inspired by one of his most important texts, his philosophy about death. In my opinion the moment when he started thinking about suicide. He was just 4,5 month in Arles. He wrote this text in a letter on 9 or 10 july in 1888 to his brother Theo: 

'But the sight of the stars always makes me dream in as simple a way as the black spots on the map, representing towns and villages, make me dream. Why, I say to myself, should the spots of light in the firmament be less accessible to us than the black spots on the map of France. Just as we take the train to go to Tarascon or Rouen, we take death to go to a star. What’s certainly true in this argument is that while alive, we cannot go to a star, any more than once dead we’d be able to take the train. So it seems to me not impossible that cholera, kidney stones, consumption, cancer are celestial means of locomotion, just as steamboats, omnibuses and the railway are terrestrial ones. To die peacefully of old age would be to go there on foot'.

A small (travel) pocketbook The journey of Vincent van Gogh - In the footsteps of Vincent which contains parts of his letters that he wrote about his journey (his career as a painter, writer, scholar and lover of art and literature), what he saw and what he thought of during his walks belongs to this work of art.

This publication serves not only as a (travel) pocketbook, it is also a reminder for myself and a precursor to the 'Vincent van Gogh interpretation by artist Petra Hart' where I show how Vincent worked towards his death. In fact ... he painted it in widescreen. After reading the Van Gogh Letters in May 2017, the interpretation arose. I use his written letters and the corresponding paintings. Vincent did commit suicide. The work of art is part of the art series Journey to the sun. More information