Appreciation of self-portrait works with ears and pipes

When Van Gogh painted "Lullaby", he drew two self-portraits, both of which were self-portraits with a bandage on his right ear, a pipe in his mouth, a fur hat and a coat in the same posture. One is mainly red (this one), and the other is mainly light green with Japanese prints as the background. From the letters of this period, we can know that his health is recovering day by day, but his guilt towards Gauguin has not been ruled out. He also told Theo that he would paint according to his own actual situation in the future and should not fall into excessive anxiety. This self-portrait can be said to look forward to the future through one's own eyes, with clear ideological expression.

After Van Gogh cut his ear, he painted several self-portraits wrapped in wounds. The three colors of orange, red and green in this painting have a lively color effect. Van Gogh smoked his pipe and looked dull. The curling white smoke can alleviate the oppressive feeling brought by the strong colors in the picture.

It is worth noting that Van Gogh is resisting the image of a suffering painter, which is not difficult to understand considering his medical history. This self-portrait was created by Van Gogh shortly after he cut off his left ear. Although the injury is serious and obvious from the picture, there is no trace of the victim painter in this self-portrait. Half a year ago, Van Gogh described himself as a priest or a monk, but in this work, he found his humbler identity. Wearing a worker's coat and a fur hat, he didn't see any signs of insanity or pain. Although he is suffering from physical and mental pain, he shows indifference and smokes his pipe calmly. However, the picture is full of tension. Clusters of dark blue hair on the hat stand upright and stand out against the orange background, which seems to symbolize abundant energy. The background is divided into two colors: orange red and bright red, with two eyes together as the axis, so the picture and the object are divided into two parts. Below this axis, the bright red background, green coat and bandage are very dazzling. The result is a unique contradiction, which is a visual contradiction deliberately used by the author, showing a thoughtful injured person who tightly wraps himself with a fur hat and clothes to resist fever.

Although the self-portrait seems to be a completely biographical work, it shows not only the trauma of the people in the painting, but also the fierce debate between two painters, that is, the debate between Van Gogh and Gauguin on the status of painters, painting methods and symbolic style. Compare it with a symbolic self-portrait of Gauguin in 1889, and the problem will be clear. In Gauguin's self-portrait, there are not only abstract color planes and winding lines, but also familiar symbolic ornaments-apples, lilies, poisonous snakes and auras, which position the painter as a sentimental person, with black hair hanging over his head like a hood, symbolizing the characters wandering between good and evil. Gauguin's works have both radical colors and traditional traces in style. If the first impression comes from the decorative composition of the picture, people can finally realize its symbolic significance. However, in his self-portraits, Van Gogh combined symbolic colors and composition with natural portraits, and practiced a new exploration and synthesis of traditional styles. However, the vivid and profound significance of this work does not come from symbolic expressions such as justice and evil, but from the warm colors and tense composition that contrast the indifference and calmness of the injured.