"In my picture of the Night Café I have tried to express the idea that the café is a place where one can ruin oneself, go mad or commit a crime."
Vincent eagerly scribbled these words to his brother. Once more the passions had seized him, lighting his eyes and filling his body with life. The waves of living played hell upon him, throwing him into the deepest and darkest of holes, pummeled by fears straight from the mouth of the universe, a soul without recourse. But he endured those times for the hopeful return of passion and its soaring intensity, to once more be Vincent the Cloud Dweller, a man of painted dreams.
"Happiness... it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort."
In moments of creation in front of the canvas, Godly powers of life flowed through Vincent. Others - the normal, the functioning, anyone less the freak than he - had their lives and families and women to keep them afloat. But he Vincent had only these moments. Now he was a force for good, fashioning a form of love into existence, knowing his authored brushstrokes were directed by his Maker. The bright and dark oils, the eager fresh canvases, the finely sensitive brushes were his sole instruments for communicating to the world, to prove he even existed.
"How can I be useful, of what service can I be? There is something inside me, what can it be?"
Afterwards was the freefall from the clouds back to earth - and finally to be trapped back in his hole. Those were the worst of times. His body electrified with life, teeming with an anticipation never articulated, believing he had done something but never knowing exactly what. What matters the cage when one is dead? But now, with the energy of the universe streaming from your pores, feeling life had no end and all of creation a beautiful dream - then the cage becomes a cross. Vincent heard the carefree laughter outside his cell, 'laughter from the moon' he called it. Doomed forever to be cut off.
"What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything?"
Vincent held a fear greater than his fear of God: banality. Torquing his emotions into his paintings exacted an ever increasing toll. And his reward of sustenance? None in this world. His only hope to have pleased the gods of art and been faithful to their nature. But the painting of the night cafe particularly satisfied him having captured perfectly his emotions and the dreamlike world of his favorite haunt. Maybe this will be the one to break through, blazing like a thunderbolt from the heavens to reveal the true depths of his talent! I am Vincent and today I shine my light.
"One may have a blazing hearth in one's soul and yet no one ever came to sit by it. Passers-by see only a wisp of smoke from the chimney and continue on their way."
Vincent clicked the button to publish his work before God and all the world, daring to strip himself once more. After a lifetime of failure, the process wreaked a growing pain into his heart, sowing discouragement, living at the mercy of simple minds and bubbled lives and patrolling predators, all anxious to destroy anything they feared greater than they. He read over the five comments he got, bewildered and beaten by the love lost in his life, and shot himself, dying two days later.
"Painting is a faith, and it imposes the duty to disregard public opinion."
The five comments on Vincent's blog posting for Night Cafe:
"Oh, God, that's like totally depressing. Creepy!"
"The fellow would enjoy more success were he to be a bit more entertaining in his pursuits and not indulge in so much dreariness."
"Oh wow, look at this one! This painting is really uptight! Maybe if you got laid dude you wouldn't be gripping that brush so hard!"
Curators at the French Salon: "Doesn't really portray the world in a positive view, does it? We have no time for negativity like this."
"This is great stuff! Everyone should love it! Is there something wrong you're not telling us?"
Plastic Ono Band - an unheralded masterpiece
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