The painter most like you

You are most like Van Gogh

You can't hide how you feel about the things you love

Wheat Field with Cypresses · 1889

Your nature

You are a heart on fire

This is a playful reading of your nature, not a scientific personality test.
The grey lines below come from Van Gogh's real life and work.

Your strength
When you love something, your energy never seems to run out. You start fast and hesitate little.
In the little more than a year he spent in Arles, Van Gogh painted about 200 oil paintings.
When you shine
You light up when something moves your heart.
He painted several pictures of sunflowers to decorate the room for Gauguin's stay at his house in Arles.
What wears you out
Long stretches among people who don't get you can wear you out.
He was not widely known in his lifetime, and very few of his paintings sold while he lived.
How you work
Your hands move before your thoughts. You find the way by trying.
Van Gogh often set up his easel in the fields and painted with the landscape in front of him.
With other people
You are a friend who gives everything. That also means you can feel hurt deeply.
His brother Theo believed in him for many years and sent him money for living and for paint.
How you rest
Even on days off you unwind by walking, looking and writing.
Even while staying at the asylum in Saint-Rémy, he painted irises, wheat fields and cypresses.

Why Van Gogh?

When something moves you, your hands start moving too. In about ten years as a painter, Van Gogh left hundreds of oil paintings and even more drawings.

He set strong colours like yellow and blue side by side and laid the paint on thick, leaving every brushstroke visible. That is why the wheat and clouds in Wheat Field with Cypresses seem to ripple in the wind.

Hundreds of his letters to his brother Theo survive, so we can still read what he looked at and which colours he worried over. He also collected Japanese prints and copied some of them to learn about colour and line.

If you give everything to what you love and can't hide it, Van Gogh is on your side.

Kindred painter · Opposite painter

Among the eight painters,
who is near and who is far

Kindred painter
Hokusai
Even after finishing something, you say 'not there yet'
You share the same burning habit of pouring everything into what you love. Together, one night of talking would never be enough.
See the Hokusai result →
Opposite painter
Vermeer
You like to sit in a quiet room and look at one thing for a long time
The Vermeer type, who polishes one thing slowly, runs at the opposite speed. Their calm can become a place for you to rest.
See the Vermeer result →

Spend a day like this painter

Today, like Van Gogh

Three small ideas. Trying just one is enough.

Choose the colour you loved most today and take a photo every time you see it.
Write a long message to someone you care about. It can simply describe what you saw today.
On a windy day, stand under a tree and trace the moving branches with your finger.

Vincent van Gogh

Step into Van Gogh's paintings

While you are here, stand in front of a painting for three minutes.
For each one, here is where to look first.

Wheat Field with Cypresses1889
How to lookFollow the brushstrokes that make the clouds. The paint stands up thickly from the canvas.
Irises1890
How to lookAmong the blue irises, find the one flower of a different colour. It is at the upper right.
Self-Portrait with a Straw Hat (obverse: The Potato Peeler)1887
How to lookNotice which way the short strokes run in the face and the hat. The background is filled with short dashes and dots too.