Art Critique - 2011/05/25(Wed.)

The Starry Night

by Vincent van Gogh

Description
There is the night sky filled with swirling clouds, stars, and a bright crescent moon. This sky keeps the viewer’s eyes moving around the painting, following the curves.
A small town lies below the hills. The center point of the town is the tall steeple of the church.
To the left of the painting there is a massive dark structure.  This structure is magnificent when compared to the scale of  other objects in the painting.
This painting is oil on canvas. The bold, intense colors, and the striking brushwork are highly expressive, even emotional.


Analysis
There are mostly curvy lines. We also could see some straight lines in the village, but mostly curvy lines. I think he had many different thoughts at the same time when he drew this picture. And Stars are becoming circle in this picture.
We can see that blue and dark blue are main colors. He used dark colors alot. At the bottom of the picture, in the viliage, mostly dark colors. At the top of the picture, in the sky, mostly light colors.
Though there are both dark and lihgt colors, I feel it's more like dull than bright.
Can you guys find some shadings of this picture? Many shadings are at bottom in black color.
I think there are many overlappings of shapes, such as circle or curvy lines. He drew same pattern several times.There are shadings certainly, but it doesn't express any three dimessions. And also it doesn't look like flat picture.


Interpretation
Feeling: When I first saw this picture, I could feel calm. The very first thing that I could find from this Van Gogh's drawing was stars and its peacful-looking villege under it.
Symbols: I don't think he has put any symbols in this masterpiece. Personally, he seems put things that he likes such as stars, trees and a small villege. I will say this picture is quite simple and obvious.
Senses: Using an imagination as the example of this anylsis makes me taste a really cool candy such as minte. Plus, I could also taste shoothing stars. Sweet? Also, I could feel really fresh air like the one that you can have at midnight!


Judgement
This painting is not representational and formalistic because in this painting the sky, the moon, and stars are all exaggerated. Starry night represents all the drama of a man anxious of communication and integration of nature. I can say this painting is absolutely valuable for its expressive and emotional ideas.